GIFT  OF 
Hearst     Fountain 


THE  WINTER  BELL 


BOOKS  BY 
HENRY  M.  RIDEOUT 

The  Winter  Bell 

Fern  Seed 

The   Foot-Path   Way 

Tin  Cowrie  Dass 

The  Far  Cry 

Key  of  the  Fields 

and  Boldero 
The  Siamese  Cat 
White  Tiger 


William  Jones 


-6 


11 

n  - 
rt 


THE 

WINTER  BELL 


By 
HENRY  MILNER  RIDEOUT 


^)°     ^** 


NEW  YORK 

DUFFIELD  AND  COMPANY 

1922 


Copyright,  1922,  by 
DUFFIELD  AND  COMPANY 


*r* 


*s- 


Printed  in  V.  S.  A. 


To 
JAMES  ARTHUR  BALLENTINE 

WITH   ALL  THAT  IS   IMPLIED   IN 
LONG  FRIENDSHIP 


4  7  S  3  6  5 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


With  rapid  sureness  of  touch  he  printed 
across  the  board,  gripped  flat  between  his 
knees,    "Sackamore."      .      .      .     Frontispiece 

"Good  evening,  Mr.  Delaforce,"  she  said 
gravely.  "How  do  you  do?"       .      Page     36 

With  a  swoop,  a  lightning  shift  of  hands,  a 
bend,  clutch  and  heave  in  one  motion, 
Salem  had  the  man  aloft.      .      .      Page  110 

"No  feelin's  to  hurt,  hey?"  rumbled  the 
deep  voice  of  Captain  Constantine.  "Good. 
Fust-rate.    The  clear  thing."  .      .      Page  142 


THE  WINTER   BELL 


THE  WINTER  BELL 


I 


In  all  the  last  thin  drift  of  snowstorm  that 
swept  the  lake  and  made  it  a  wilderness  without 
borders,  there  appeared  only  one  dark  object. 
This  was  a  man  on  snowshoes,  who  came  with 
the  wind  at  his  back.  Smoking  flights  of  dry 
snow  continually  outstripped  him;  his  breath 
whirled  a'head  and  vanished  in  them;  so  that  his 
advance  over  the  white  waste  had  a  labored  air, 
as  if  he  were  lagging  amid  universal  hurry. 

Anyone  who  had  tried  to  keep  pace  with  him 
would  have  found  this  retardation  a  mere  fancy, 
perhaps  a  painful  fancy  after  half  an  hour  or  so; 
for  Salem  Delaforce  was  moving  rapidly,  with 
a  light  swing  more  trot  than  walk.  A  white 
rabbit,  hanging  dead  at  his  waist  in  front,  jog- 
gled as  if  trying  limply  to  run,  head  downward. 
Big-boned,  spare,  Salem  had  even  in  winter  wrap- 

s 


4  THE  WINTER  BELL 

pings  a  look  of  slenderness  which,  like  his  pres- 
ent gait,  deceived  the  eye.  Kersey  trousers 
tucked  into  yellow  oil-tanned  "larrigans,"  and  an 
old  brownish  blanket  coat  mottled  with  ermine- 
like dabs  of  pale  red  and  gray,  hung  loose  upon 
him  to  disguise  the  power  of  his  frame.  Snow 
plastered  his  back,  but  was  chafed  away  by  a 
shotgun  that  swung  there,  its  muzzle  ringed  with 
two  frozen  doughnuts.  Melting  snow  on  the 
lashes  fringed  his  dark  brown  eyes ;  through  mois- 
ture as  of  tears  they  looked  out,  steady,  thought- 
ful, young,  and  very  bright.     His  cheeks  glowed. 

Once  he  halted  and  turned  impulsively  to  face 
the  wind.  The  white  rabbit  hanging  at  his  waist 
had  its  fur  immediately  blown  into  ruffled  partings. 

"Lord,  forgot  again  I"  said  the  hunter  angrily. 
"Thought  he  was  followhV  me.    Never  no  more." 

He  peered  for  a  moment  into  the  snow.  It 
pricked  his  face  like  needles.  Yet  the  range 
of  his  vision  over  the  lake  had  widened,  for  these 
flying  wraiths  began  to  lose  their  whiteness.  The 
wind  whistled  in  his  gun  barrel.  There  was  also 
a  hissing,  gritty  sound  that  streamed  by,  a  sound 
as  of  sifting,  very  faint,  but  notable,  a  change 
throughout  the  solitude. 

"Goin'  to  sleet."  Salem  went  forward  again. 
"I  keep  thinkin'  he's  after  me.     Never  no  more." 


THE  WINTER  BELL  5 

The  youngster's  dark  eyes  contracted,  his  lips 
worked  strangely.  He  rubbed  one  snow-crusted 
mitten  roughly  across  them,  and  then,  like  a  man 
who  had  driven  away  some  pain  of  body  or  grief 
of  mind,  went  swinging  on  with  the  wind,  his 
face  hard  set,  almost  grim. 

"We'll  git  a  thaw  pooty  quick." 

His  bear-paw  snowshoes  left  their  oval  prints 
in  a  track  which,  so  far  as  it  could  be  seen,  drew 
a  rigidly  straight  line  on  the  snow.  Without 
need  of  thought,  by  homing  instinct,  from  one 
hidden  point  far  behind  toward  another  far 
aihead,  through  blind  swirling  space  he  had  come 
direct;  and  now  this  change  in  the  air — a  slight 
clearing  while  drifts  no  longer  spun  upward  from 
the  lake,  and  the  snowfall  turned  as  from  fine 
dry  salt  to  pellets  of  sago — affected  his  march  not 
at  all.  He  kept  the  same  course,  the  same  untir- 
ing, rapid  jog. 

Half  an  hour  later  he  swerved  from  this  bee 
line.  A  bald  round  patch  of  ice  lay  before  him, 
clean  swept  in  a  freak  by  the  wind,  like  a  pond 
made  ready  for  skaters.  He  began  to  skirt  the 
left-hand  margin,  but  when  halfway  round, 
stopped. 

On  the  opposite  rim  of  the  ice  appeared  an- 
other dark  object.     At  first  glance  it  resembled 


6  THE  WINTER  BELL 

the  butt  of  a  small  log;  at  second  glance,  an  up- 
rooted stump  with  a  brown  clod  of  earth. 

Salem  turned  and  went  quickly  toward  it,  his 
snowshoes  clattering  and  slipping  as  on  green 
glass. 

It  was,  or  had  been,  a  man.  The  head, 
shoulders,  and  one  arm  lay  on  the  ice,  all  the  rest 
hidden,  as  if  he  had  pulled  up  a  coverlet  before 
going  to  sleep.  The  face,  turned  away,  had  its 
right  cheek  frozen  in,  and  a  wisp  of  snow  across 
the  left  eye  like  a  bandage. 

Salem  crouched  on  one  knee,  looked  intently, 
then  came  upright  again.  He  took,  it  might  have 
been  thought,  great  pains  not  to  touch  this  body. 
The  wind,  as  before,  prolonged  a  droning  whistle 
in  his  gun  barrel,  and  when  he  spoke,  wrenched 
the  words  out  of  his  lips. 

"It's  Asy  Beard." 

The  dead  man's  face  had  nothing  of  that  dig- 
nity which  sometimes  is  granted.  Even  by  what 
few  features  were  revealed  it  had  a  mean,  wolfish 
look.  The  lips,  parted  as  if  to  sneer,  clung  hard 
along  broken  teeth,  tobacco-stained,  that  looked 
all  canine.  Two  kinds  of  snow,  fine  and  coarse, 
had  pelted  into  the  rusty  brown  stiff  hair,  and 
gave  it  the  likeness,  cruelly  exact,  of  a  bit  of  old 
doormat. 


THE  WINTER  BELL  7 

The  living  man's  face  remained  inscrutable. 
The  color  of  health  and  storm-blown  exercise, 
darkly  flaming  in  his  cheeks,  could  not  alter.  His 
eyes  did  not,  perhaps :  they  contained  much  mus- 
ing, some  natural  pity,  but  no  dread  and  no 
surprise. 

"Well,  Asy,"  he  said,  "guess  we're  even  now. 
Him  that  dies  pays  all  off." 

He  stooped  again,  and  after  a  longer  interval 
than  before,  again  rose. 

"You're  fast  to  the  ice.  Ain't  got  nothin'  with 
me.     Some  pesky  thief  carried  off  my  axe." 

It  was  no  weather  to  stand  still  in,  but  for  a 
time  the  young  man  waited  there,  keeping  his 
fellow  creature  company.  When  at  last  he  went 
forward  the  sleet  as  it  drove  was  dissolving  into 
a  chill  rain.  Not  far  ahead  the  end  of  the  lake 
grew  visible,  a  cove  where  land  and  water  were 
marked  off  only  by  smooth-curving  snowbanks, 
with  here  and  there  a  clump  of  willow  switches 
or  the  long  white  slant  of  a  buried  pine  trunk 
fallen  years  ago.  Above  these,  darkening  the 
cove,  stood  firs  all  padded  white  on  the  windward 
side,  all  green  and  shadow-black  on  the  leeward. 
Above  their  jagged  points,  in  turn,  low  hills  ad- 
vanced through  the  departing  sleet,  some  dark 
evergreen,  others — bare  rock  too  steep  for  snow 


8  THE  WINTER  BELL 

to    cling    on — a    grayness    lined    vertically    with 
thread's  of  white  birch. 

Midway  in  the  cove  Salem  climbed  ashore, 
pausing  at  a  hole  chopped  in  the  ice,  and  a  stake 
on  which  hung  a  black  tin  can  upside  down.  He 
broke  the  new  ice  in  the  hole,  filled  the  can,  then 
went  straight  toward  the  deepest  bend  of  the  fir 
wall.  Here,  muffled  with  snow,  hidden  like  an 
animal  by  its  marking,  a  cabin  crouched  among 
the  boughs.  He  passed  round  this  and  entered-* 
a  small  clearing  behind. 

At  the  back  of  the  clearing  a  fire  burned  low 
under  an  iron  pot.  It  had  been  a  large  fire,  for 
up  the  nearest  white  wall  reached  an  evergreen 
band  where  snow  had  melted  from  fir  tips,  and 
round  its  embers  in  a  wide  ring  last  year's  wood- 
land carpet  lay  bared — yellow  grass,  leather- 
brown  brakes,  the  dark  red  gloss  of  old  checker- 
berry  leaves,  and  one  bright  green  spray  of 
princess  pine.  Smoke  still  mounted  into  the  driz- 
zle, and  the  rim  of  the  pot  lid  steamed. 

Bringing  dry  wood  from  a  lean-to  behind  his 
cabin,  Salem  gathered  his  fallen  fire  and  made  it 
high  again. 

"Like  to  ketch  the  thief,"  he  told  himself, 
"that  moseyed  off  with  my  axe." 

While  the  fresh  blaze  was  growing  he  laid  his 


THE  WINTER  BELL  9 

mittens  on  the  pot,  removed  from  his  gun  barrel 
the  frozen  doughnuts,  placed  them  to  thaw  be- 
side the  mittens,  and  set  some  willow-bark  tea 
brewing  in  the  tin  can.  He  worked  with  method, 
like  one  who  used  time  thriftily  but  had  no  need 
for  haste.  From  the  lean-to,  where  he  hung 
under  cover  his  gun  and  the  white  rabbit,  he 
brought  an  oblong  bit  of  pine  board,  a  hammer, 
some  old  crooked  hand-wrought  nails,  a  two- 
foot  wooden  stake,  a  hoe,  a  shovel,  a  corner  of 
broken  glass,  and  a  flat,  rusty  iron  fragment  of 
sled  runner.  This  last  he  poked  into  the  fire. 
Then,  taking  off  snowshoes,  he  sat  on  one  be- 
neath a  bough,  arranged  the  other  as  a  table  or 
workbench,  and  so,  warmed  by  the  fire,  sheltered 
from  the  mist,  continued  quietly  busy. 

"Go  down  to  Corp'ration  House,  ought  to, 
and  tell  'em  about  Asy  Beard."  With  the  broken 
glass  he  smoothed  one  surface  of  the  pine  board. 
"  'Tain't  right  to  leave  him  layin'  out  there.  But 
no  good  my  tellin'  'em  after  dark.  Better  start 
to-morrow  daylight  in  the  mornin',  git  there  early 
forenoon,  then  keep  on  down  to  Middle  Landin' 
store.     Make  one  journey  of  two  arrants." 

Having  smoothed  the  board,  Salem  turned  to 
his  noonday  meal.  It  was  lean  fare,  nothing 
but  willow-bark  tea  and  the  pair  of  moist,  luke- 


to  THE  WINTER  BELL 

warm  doughnuts.  He  ate  and  drank  like  a  stoic 
whose  thoughts  went  elsewhere. 

"Le's  see  what  we  want  to  the  store — besides 
a  axe.  Tea's  give  out,  tobacco's  give  out. 
Matches,  and  maybe  a  little  sugar." 

He  soon  fell  to  work  again.  With  the  board 
gripped  flat  between  his  knees  he  drew  from  the 
heart  of  the  fire  his  broken  sled  runner.  Its  point 
glowed  orange  red,  starred  with  tiny  bright 
sparks  that  vanished.  Round  its  cooler  end  he 
wrapped  a  wet  mitten.  It  made  an  awkward 
tool,  all  weight  and  no  balance;  but  in  Salem's 
thin  brown  hands  it  quivered  no  more  than  a 
pencil.  With  rapid  sureness  of  touch,  unhindered 
by  the  smoke  curling  thickly  upward,  he  wrote  or 
printed  across  the  board.  His  lettering  was  neat, 
his  alignment  true. 

"sackamore" 

Delaforce  laid  his  branding  iron  down,  blew 
off  the  charred  powder,  and  shook  his  head. 

"Can't  even  spell,"  he  grumbled.  "Prob'ly 
ain't  right.     I  don't  know  nothing." 

He  nailed  the  board  to  the  stake,  put  it  aside 
with  his  tools,  brought  out  from  one  pocket  an 
old  cheap  wooden  pipe,  from  another  some  dried 
willow  bark  mixed  with  sweet  fern,  and  compos- 


THE  WINTER  BELL  n 

ing  himself  cross-legged,  took  a  meditative  smoke. 
He  had  not  rested  since  daybreak.  Even  now  he 
was  only  waiting  for  the  fire  to  burn  low 
again;  and  by  the  time  his  second  pipeful  went 
out  he  waited  no  longer,  but  impatiently  rising, 
lifted  the  iron  pot  away,  grasped  his  hoe,  and 
began  to  tear  down  the  fire. 

"Git  it  over  with." 

He  dug  fiercely,  scattering  brands  and  coals 
that  hissed  as  they  turned  black  and  bedded  them- 
selves in  snow.  Under  the  ashes  appeared  a 
shallow  trench,  its  floor  and  walls  of  half-thawed 
mud.  Salem  cut  them  deeper  and  wider,  until 
his  hoe  sliced  through  glassy  honeycomb,  the  crys- 
tals of  the  frost.  He  then  poured  in  scalding 
water  from  the  pot,  waited,  and  after  the  steam 
had  cleared  from  a  new  depth  of  mud,  began 
hoeing  again.  This  process  he  repeated  many 
times.  When  the  pot  was  empty  and  the  hoe 
could  fetch  out  no  more  chips  of  frozen  earth, 
he  drove  the  stake  in  upright  at  the  far  end  of 
the  hole,  so  that  board  and  legend  stood  facing 
him,  level  with  the  ground. 

"Have  to  do.     Deep  as  I  can  manage." 

He  waded  among  the  trees,  and  with  a  knife 
slashed  off  an  armful  of  small  fir  branches.  Car- 
rying them,  the  young  man  would  have  had  a 


12  THE  WINTER  BELL 

Christmaslike  air  but  for  the  steady  Indian  sad- 
ness of  his  eyes. 

"Better  for  him  than  bare  ground." 

He  lined  the  pit  carefully  with  the  Christmas 
greens,  placing  and  replacing  them  till  every  tip 
lay  in  order. 

"There." 

His  next  action  was  to  clear  away  tools,  all 
but  the  shovel.  Having  done  this  he  went  round 
to  the  door  of  the  cabin. 

"Can't  hardly  bear  to  go  in." 

Salem  wiped  his  snowshoes  cleaner  than  usual, 
grasping  at  any  means  of  delay.  It  was  with 
reluctance,  visible  effort,  that  he  opened  the  door 
and  entered.  His  dwelling,  one  room  sheathed 
with  black  paper,  and  very  dark  by  contrast  even 
with  the  subdued,  rainy  light  of  the  woods,  con- 
tained a  stove,  a  bunk,  table  and  chairs,  a  cup- 
board, tiers  of  stove  wood  against  the  wall,  and 
along  the  rafters  a  few  spare  clothes,  household 
goods,  and  small  pelts  of  fur.  Salem  hung  his 
snowshoes  by  the  foot  holes  on  a  nail  in  the  black 
paper.     He  stood  for  a  moment  irresolute. 

Across  the  room  in  his  bunk  lay  something  cov- 
ered with  a  blanket,  like  a  child  hiding  and  keep- 
ing still.  As  though  it  were  a  child  Delaforce 
lifted  and  carried  this  bundle  outdoors. 


THE  WINTER  BELL  13 

What  he  unwrapped  and  lowered  into  the 
evergreen  grave  was  the  body  of  a  white  bull 
terrier.  He  was  very  slow  in  laying  the  firs  over 
it,  but  swift  in  putting  back  the  clotted  earth. 

"You  was  a  good  friend.     None  better." 

He  rose  to  look  at  the  board  and  his  dog's 
name. 

"I  won't  never  forget  you."  His  face  was 
hard  while  he  spoke,  but  not  his  eyes.  "Part  o' 
the  best  days  o'  my  life  buried  with  you." 

The  rain  had  ceased  when  darkness  came  that 
night,  and  with  darkness  a  still  and  bitter  frost 
creeping  to  the  heart  of  the  woods.  No  air 
stirred.  Even  the  dry  leaves  of  a  young  beech 
near  the  cabin,  that  since  last  autumn  had  waggled 
and  whispered  foolishly  in  lesser  silences,  were 
dumb.  Salem,  eating  a  late  supper  by  the  light 
of  a  candle  end,  now  heard  the  fire  snap  cheer- 
fully in  the  stove  behind  him,  now  listened  to 
trees  groaning  far  off,  to  noises  harsh  and  brittle 
as  the  breaking  of  a  file. 

There  were  left  in  his  plate  some  bones  of  the 
rabbit  he  had  brought  home.  Without  thinking 
Salem  took  one  of  these  and  held  it  round  behind 
his  chair. 

"Here  you  are,"  he  said. 

The  stillness  recalled  him.     He  looked  down, 


i4  THE  WINTER  BELL 

saw  the  empty  floor,  dashed  the  bone  furiously 
from  his  hand,  and  turning,  blew  out  the  candle. 

Frost  veiled  the  bottom  of  each  windowpane, 
but  left  at  the  top  a  curved  space  clear.  Cold  stars 
glittered  above  the  whiteness  where  his  enemy 
lay.  They  could  not  throw  unwelcome  light  into 
this  room  from  which  his  friend  had  gone,  or 
know  that  he  saw  them  as  crosses. 


II 


Well  filled  with  hardwood,  the  stove  always 
kept  its  fire  going  for  two  hours.  A  light  sleeper, 
Salem  had  formed  the  habit  of  rousing  before 
the  room  grew  cold,  so  that  his  night  was  broken 
at  regular  intervals.  From  deep  slumber  he  came 
quietly  awake,  each  time  to  find  a  bed  of  coals 
glowing  like  orange-red  flowers,  to  cover  them 
with  kindling,  split  birch,  and  round  maple,  to 
glance  at  the  starlight  for  signs  of  weather,  and 
to  be  next  moment  in  his  bunk  asleep  for  two 
hours  more. 

Dawn  found  him  on  foot,  beginning  his  day. 
The  frost  no  longer  murmured  or  groaned  with- 
out. A  gentle  clashing  and  crackle  seemed  to 
fill  the  obscurity.  On  every  windowpane  the 
little  hill-and-valley  landscape  of  frost  work 
had  thickened  with  furry  whiteness  during  the 
night,  but  left  near  its  top  a  loophole  of  melting 
glaze  through  which  the  outdoor  world  shone  as 
a  mist  of  intense  pale  blue.     This  color  and  the 

15 


1 6  THE  WINTER  BELL 

strange  airy  clashing  pervaded  all  things  like  a 
wonder  that  longed  to  be  understood. 

Salem  was  aware  of  it.  He  knew  the  sound, 
he  felt  the  quality  of  the  light. 

"Lon'some  mornin's  without  you,  Sack,"  was 
all  he  said.  "Maybe  Duster  Whiteneck's  kep' 
one  of  them  pups  of  yours,  to  town.  I'll  haf  to 
see  Duster.  If  he'd  sell,  take  along  my  black- 
cat  skin." 

For  breakfast  he  had  what  was  left  of  the 
rabbit  stew,  warmed  over  with  hardtack  sopped 
in  gravy,  and  more  willow  tea ;  no  meal  to  linger 
over.  The  sun  had  not  risen  when  he  stepped 
outdoors,  though  all  the  mysterious  pale  blue 
vapor  was  gone,  and  the  clear  eastern  sky  bright- 
ening. From  the  cabin  eaves  a  row  of  new  icicles 
hung,  broad  and  short,  in  the  Saxon  tooth  pattern. 

"Crust'll  hold.  Don't  need  ye."  Talking  thus 
to  his  snowshoes  he  slung  them  with  his  gun  on 
his  back.     "May,  though,  comin'  home." 

Over  his  breast  like  a  magnificent  boa  he  car- 
ried some  furs — two  of  mink,  one  of  musquash, 
and  one,  somewhat  like  sable,  which  he  called 
his  black-cat,  the  rare  and  beautiful  fur  of  a  fisher. 
Any  expert  would  have  admired  the  skinning  and 
cleaning.  Salem  betrayed  no  pride,  but  counted 
them  and  smoothed  the  hair.     Each  had  been 


THE  WINTER  BELL  17 

shot  through  the  head  by  a  man  who  de- 
spised traps.  He  shouldered  two  long  faggot- 
like bundles  of  split  hoop  poles,  cast  a  look  at 
the  cabin  to  see  all  tight,  and  set  out  briskly. 

The  footing  held,  as  he  had  predicted.  Every- 
where below  the  trees  undulated  a  surface  glim- 
mering with  dull  polish  like  that  on  the  icing  of 
cake.  Now  and  then  it  cracked  under  his  moc- 
casin boots,  leaving  a  wide  shallow  depression, 
where  powdery  snow  burst  upward  among 
triangular  plates  of  crust;  but  this  happened  sel- 
dom, for  he  went  with  a  practised  gliding  step 
as  clean  and  true  as  the  motion  of  a  skater.  Be- 
tween the  firs  an  abandoned  logging  road,  un- 
broken, flowed  like  a  white  brook.  It  brought 
him  suddenly  out  upon  Lambkill  Heath  while  the 
sun  was  clearing  the  evergreen  tops. 

"Gorry,  but  she's  handsome!"  thought  Salem. 

The  heath,  its  buried  tufts  wavy  with  bluish  hol- 
lows and  white  mounds,  dazzled  him  as  the  early 
sunshine  poured  across.  But  this  was  nothing  to 
the  glory  that  ringed  it  about,  far  and  near.  A 
crystal  forest  shone  with  twinkling  white  fire. 
Young  birches,  maples  and  poplars,  ice  coated, 
their  boughs  drooped  like  weeping  willow,  caught 
the  full  blaze  of  morning  sun  in  a  network  brighter 
than  jewels.    Whenever  a  breath  of  wind  stirred, 


i8  THE  WINTER  BELL 

the  twigs,  like  so  many  thousand  glass  pendants, 
clattered  faintly  and  swung  on  from  tree  to  tree 
a  passing  lustre  that  sparkled  along  the  entire  wall 
of  the  woods. 

Walking  high  over  the  heath-top  waves,  Dela- 
force  did  not  stop  to  admire.  He  felt  an  exalta- 
tion on  his  journey;  but  this  was  gone  next 
moment  when  he  saw  his  long-drawn  shadow 
traveling  alone,  with  no  dog's  shadow  trotting 
after  on  the  snow;  he  had  known  more  than  one 
silver  thaw;  and  though  in  the  middle  of  the 
heath  he  paused,  it  was  only  to  listen. 

Through  the  crackling  brightness  of  the  en- 
chanted forest  he  heard  a  sound.  It  came  from 
behind  him,  perhaps  more  than  a  mile  away,  but 
clear  in  the  winter  air — the  ringing  of  a  bell, 
a  little  bell  with  a  mellow  tone,  jangled  slowly  in 
broken  rhythm,  as  if  by  an  uncertain  but  persever- 
ing hand. 

"A  sled  comin'  down  lake,"  thought  Salem. 
"Pity  the  shanks  of  any  poor  hoss,  crustin*  it 
to-day." 

With  a  few  last  single  notes  the  bell  stopped 
ringing.  Salem  waited,  but  heard  it  no  longer, 
and  started  on.  Ringing  or  silent,  it  did  not 
mean  much  to  him  at  the  time. 

His   track,    the   disused   logging   road,    began 


THE  WINTER  BELL  19 

once  more  across  the  heath  and  curved  through 
the  brilliant  crystal  wood  where  every  twig  hung 
down  to  end  in  a  sunlit  drop  of  icicle.  From 
this  he  plunged  into  evergreen  darkness,  which 
continued  for  an  hour  or  more.  Once  the  smooth 
white  ribbon  of  crust  was  broken;  something 
heavy  had  wallowed  across  it  to  go  smashing  on 
through  the  firs;  and  Salem,  who  knew  this  dam- 
age for  the  work  of  a  bear,  dropped  his  mer- 
chandise, unslung  his  gun,  crawled  among  boughs 
and  loosened  snow,  jumped  up,  and  ran  like  an 
Indian  along  the  edge  of  the  bear's  track.  Not  so 
fresh  as  it  looked,  after  two  miles  of  hot  pursuit 
it  vanished  among  naked  crags  and  horsebacks, 
gray,  wind-swept  rock.  Without  look  or  gesture  of 
disappointment  Salem  returned  quietly  to  take  up 
his  furs  and  hoop  poles  again. 

The  sun  was  high  when  he  came  down  Rum- 
Time  Hill  toward  the  flowage.  Here  his  old  for- 
gotten road  joined  a  stream  that  wandered  away 
from  the  lake.  Ice  had  now  melted  off  the  trees, 
their  fairyland  shining  departed;  so  that  under 
little  promontory  shadows  a  lilac  mist  of  alders, 
a  tawny  mist  of  willows,  followed  the  crooks  of 
the  flowage,  which  revealed  itself  here  as  black 
ice,  there  as  thin  curved  patches  of  crust. 

"Gained  on  me." 


20  THE  WINTER  BELL 

Salem  halted,  and  listened. 

The  little  mellow  bell  was  jangling  once  more, 
slowly,  not  far  upstream.  Once  more  it  made 
fitful  music  in  the  solitude,  as  if  rung  by  an  un- 
certain but  persevering  hand.  He  had  no  knowl- 
edge of  how  that  hand  could  persevere,  or  how, 
to  some  book-learned  persons,  it  might  have 
seemed  the  hand  of  a  blind  goddess  who  comes 
at  her  own  pace  everywhere. 

By  early  afternoon  he  sighted  Corporation 
House,  a  gray  sag-roofed  cabin,  relic  of  other 
days,  that  lingered,  not  yet  ready  to  fall,  where 
dry  cat-tails  whispered  and  shivered  in  a  frozen 
marsh.  From  its  chimney  smoke  went  mounting 
past  frayed  hackmatack  points  on  a  sky  of  more 
than  midsummer  blue.  Salem  climbed  the  bank, 
tossed  his  long  hoop-pole  faggots  down,  knocked 
at  the  door,  and  put  his  head  inside.  It  wias  a 
familiar  room  that  he  saw,  gloomy,  though  lighted 
by  one  square  window  in  the  opposite  gable.  It 
smelled  of  hay  mattresses  and  of  green  wood  try- 
ing to  burn. 

"And  so  the  old  man,"  droned  a  lazy  voice 
from  somewhere  on  the  floor — uso  the  old  feller 
he  muckles  to  his  pipe,  and  he  squats,  and  s'e, 
'Chop  'em  down,  Dan;  I  feel  like  rottinV  " 

Some    interminable    story    paused,    while    two 


THE  WINTER  BELL  21 

listeners  gazed  at  the  open  door  and  the  new- 
comer. They  sat  smoking,  each  on  the  end  of  a 
bunk,  with  a  rusty  stove  between  them. 

"Hallo,  Sale,"  said  one.  He  was  a  long,  dark, 
thin,  melancholy  young  man. 

"Why,  Sale  Delfers,  'tis."  The  second,  who 
looked  like  the  first  in  a  disguise  of  age,  with  white 
hair  and  narrow  white  whisker,  peered  and  made 
sure  before  speaking.  "How'd  ye  git  here, 
Sale?" 

"Afoot."  Salem  knew  the  pair  well.  It  was 
Pum  Redman,  of  Wing  Dam,  and  his  father. 
"How  are  ye?  And  Trapper  Kingcome  still 
a-layin'  behind  the  stove  tellin'  lies?" 

The  floor  trembled  as  a  great  weight  shifted 
on  the  boards,  and  next  moment  a  face  like  a  red 
and  freckled  moon  rose,  grinning,  through  the 
blur  of  heat  waves  that  danced  above  the  stove. 

"Hallo,  boy!"  This  interrupted  story-teller 
was  a  huge,  broad  man,  all  solid  flesh  and  lazy 
good  humor.  His  pale  red  hair  seemed  to  flicker 
in  the  heat,  his  pale  blue  eyes  to  wink  between 
raddled  slumber  and  acute  watching.  "Come  in, 
shut  the  door,  we  hain't  brass  monkeys.  Afoot, 
hey?     And  alon'?     Where's  dog?" 

Salem  entered. 

"Someb'dy  poisoned  him  on  me,"  he  replied. 


22  THE  WINTER  BELL 

"Who?"  All  three  men  spoke  at  once.  Young 
Pum,  of  Wing  Dam,  shook  his  head  mournfully; 
old  Pum  removed  his  pipe  to  stare;  Trapper 
Kingcome  swore  loud  and  deep.     "Who  did?" 

"I  do'  know."  Salem  tugged  off  his  mittens 
and  spread  his  hands  over  the  stove.  "What  I 
come  down  to  tell  ye  was,  Asy  Beard's  dead. 
And  git  help.  Found  him  fast  to  the  lake,  half 
froze  in.  Out  on  the  ice  not  fur  from  my  cove. 
Didn't  have  nothin'  to  chop  him  free." 

Silence  greeted  this  news;  a  silence  which,  as 
Delaforce  went  on  warming  his  hands,  was  grad- 
ually broken  by  the  jangle  of  the  solitary  bell  out- 
doors. 

"That's  goin'  to  look  bad,  maybe,  Sale,"  said 
Kingcome  quietly. 

Salem  glanced  up  in  surprise.  He  found  them 
all  watching  him  as  if  with  doubt. 

"What's  goin'  to?" 

"You  and  Asy  fought  over  that  dog,"  declared 
Trapper. 

"So  we  did,  last  fall.  I  licked  him  fair,"  said 
Salem.  "And  Asy  twenty  pound  heavier  than 
me.    A  good  twenty." 

Trapper's  moon  face,  dotted  and  flaming,  wore 
an  unwonted  gravity. 

"Fo'ks'll  think "     He  paused  and  shook 


THE  WINTER  BELL  23 

his  big  head.      uAsy  Beard   swore   to  kill   that 

dog,  and  you  'lowed  if  he  did Fo'ks  heard 

ye,  Sale.  You  said  'twould  be  the  last  dog  ever 
he'd  lay  his  dirty  hand  on." 

Young  Pum  gave  a  disconsolate  nod. 

"Yeah,"  said  he.     "That's  right,  too.'1 

Salem,  with  his  hands  outspread  but  forgotten, 
stared  from  one  to  another  of  these  men.  He 
felt  great  amazement  and  a  little  anger.  They 
were  all  three  good  friends  of  his. 

"Why,  what  in  tunket  ails  ye?"  he  cried.  "I 
never  touched  him!" 

What  his  hearers  thought  of  this  declaration 
he  could  not  fathom.  They  continued  to  eye 
him  strangely.  The  mellow  clanging  of  the  sled 
bell  quickened  and  came  with  a  final  hurry,  a 
slap-slap  of  trace  chains  on  thills,  and  the  sharp- 
edged  noise  of  runners  ripping  the  crust.  A  pause 
followed,  a  moment  of  stillness;  and  then  a  voice 
hailed  Corporation  House. 

"Hey!    Who's  in?" 

All  four  men  went  to  the  door  without  haste. 

The  keen  blue  sky,  the  afternoon  sunlight  on 
the  snow,  made  them  blink  like  drowsy  animals 
coming  out  of  a  cavern.  Below  them,  close  at 
hand,  two  ragged  lines  of  bush  tops  marked  where 
the   road  curved   between    flowage    and    cat-tail 


24  THE  WINTER  BELL 

marsh ;  and  here  a  steaming  bay  horse,  his  winter 
coat  frosted  white  down  his  neck,  along  his  collar 
and  round  the  root  of  his  tail,  stood  harnessed  to 
a  sled.  A  pair  of  strangers,  bulky  in  fur  coats, 
one  of  black  bear  and  one  of  brown-dyed  sheep- 
skin, clung  each  to  a  stake  and  peered  upward. 
What  little  of  their  faces  could  be  seen  glowed 
fiery.  Between  them  on  the  sled  lay  something 
flat  under  a  blanket. 

The  driver,  in  the  bearskin,  wrapped  his  reins 
round  a  sled  stake  and  beckoned. 

"We  got  a  dead  man  here."  He  spoke  not 
without  gusto.  "Found  him  on  the  lake  this 
mornin'.     Come  see  if  it's  anybody  ye  know." 

The  Redmans,  father  and  son,  obeyed.  Trap- 
per Kingcome,  as  he  began  to  follow,  gave  Salem 
a  brief  stare,  remarkable  in  such  lazy  pale  orbs 
for  its  hardness. 

UI  don't  want  to  look  on  him  again,"  said 
Salem,  and  remained  leaning  in  the  doorway. 

He  saw  the  driver  stoop  unwieldily  to  roll 
back  the  horse  blanket,  while  his  friends  gathered 
in  line,  forming  with  the  strangers  a  wall  of 
backs  that  hid  the  sled.  He  heard  the  driver's 
tone  of  relish  and  importance. 

"We  been  up  there  gittin'  out  knees  for  the 
Grecian  Bend.  .   .   .  Yeah.    You  know  her:  three- 


THE  WINTER  BELL  25 

master,  is  to  be,  on  Honey  Cocksall's  ways.  . 
Yeah.  Coming  out  this  forenoon  we  run  acrost 
this  poor  feller."  The  exhibitor  lowered  his 
voice.  It  rumbled  on.  uHit  him  'bove  the  right 
ear  with  the  blunt  of  a  axe.  .  .  .  What  I  say. 
.  .  .  Yeah.  There's  the  axe.  Found  her  under 
the  snow  alongside  him.  .  .  .  What  was  left  o' 
snowshoe  tracks,  them  bobtail  kind,  plain  enough 
in  the  crust  f'm  where  he  laid  to  a  camp  ashore. 
Who  lived  there?" 

Salem  heard  no  answer;  but  he  saw  Kingcome's 
great  bulk  move.  Quietly,  as  if  having  seen 
enough,  Trapper  drew  back  and  turned  saunter- 
ing up  to  the  house. 

He  passed  in  without  a  look,  but  whispered 
fiercely  from  the  corner  of  his  mouth,  "Come 
here,  Sale!     Come  here!" 

No  sooner  had  the  young  man  joined  him  than 
with  the  same  ferocity,  quick  and  silent  as  a 
pouncing  cat,  he  closed  the  door,  gripped  Salem's 
arm,  and  swung  him  across  the  room  to  the  bunk 
below  the  gable  window.  His  free  hand  was 
holding  out  a  little  heap  of  silver  coins  and  dirty 
green  paper. 

"You  take  this.  All  I  got  on  me."  His  broad, 
freckled  face  burned  with  excitement.  "Out  that 
winder,    and    make    tracks    acrost    the    border! 


26  THE  WINTER  BELL 

Quick!  The  man's  a  depatty  shariff  down  to 
Middle  Landin\  I  know  him.  He's  got  your 
axe.  You're  the  only  one  round  here  wears  that 
pattrun  o'  snowshoe.     Come,  shin  outl" 

Salem  did  nothing  but  look  bewilderment.  He 
had  never  seen  Trapper  like  this,  transformed, 
except  in  time  of  danger  to  somebody  else.  It 
was  the  trait  by  which  the  gross  lounger  and 
gossip  had  first  won  him. 

"No."     He  pushed  Kingcome's  hand  away. 

"Take  it.  Pay  me  back  when  ye  git  some- 
wheres  safe." 

Not  Trapper's  words  but  his  eyes,  began  to 
have  meaning. 

"What?"  cried  Salem  in  horror.  "Do  you  think 
I  done  it?" 

The  other  let  go  his  arm,  tried  to  stifle  his 
mouth. 

"Never  mind  what  I  think!  You  git!  Clear 
out  or  they'll  hang  ye,  boy." 

Footsteps  and  voices  were  coming  up  the 
bank. 

"I  never  touched  him,"  said  Salem.  His  brown 
eyes  rebuked  this  friend.  "Told  ye  so  once 
a'ready." 

A  deliberate,  padded  knocking  sounded 
throughout  the  room;  somebody  at  the  threshold 


THE  WINTER  BELL  27 

kicked  snow  from  his  moccasins.    The  door  began 
to  open. 

"Oh,  why  didn'  ye?"  Trapper  groaned,  and 
sat  down  on  the  bunk  like  one  exhausted.  "Never 
knowed  such  a  young  fooll" 


Ill 


One  day  in  the  following  spring  Salem  had 
reason  to  think  his  friend  Trapper  Kingcome 
right.  It  was  a  very  fine  day.  With  eyes  closed 
or  eyesight  lost  a  man  would  have  known  how 
fine,  and  of  what  season;  for  besides  an  unmis- 
takable new  mildness  in  the  air,  that  smell  of 
drying  mud  which  is  more  delicate  than  perfume 
told  how  earth  lay  warming,  released  from 
winter,  uncovered  to  the  sun.  Whiffs  came  now 
and  then  from  a  distant  bonfire,  aromatic  smoke 
of  burning  evergreen;  these  having  drifted  by, 
there  settled  a  warm  drowsiness  through  which 
pine  lumber  diffused  its  clean,  hearty  scent;  and 
in  fits  of  energy,  broken  by  silence  and  rest,  a 
horsewhip  beat  on  a  carpet,  volleying  broad 
smacks  that  echoed. 

Salem  had  not  gone  blind.  The  feeling  of 
spring  ran  in  his  veins,  at  once  languid  and 
restless,  a  current  overcharged  with  winter 
vitality  which  prompted  him  to  be  doing  yet 
checked  him  by  a  sleepy  surfeit.  He  knew  the 
season   for   spring,    acknowledged   the   glory   of 

28 


THE  WINTER  BELL  29 

the  day.  He  sat  on  a  bench  in  the  town  jail  of 
Crossport. 

The  walls  that  imprisoned  him  had  once  been 
whitewashed,  but  now  were  a  crazy  patchwork  of 
bare  lath,  of  old  lime  scratched  with  obscene  words 
and  pictures,  and  of  great  brown  spider-legged 
stains  left  by  tobacco  juice.  One  barred  window, 
without  glass,  admitted  near  the  ceiling  enough 
reflection  of  sunlight  to  reveal  the  broken  plaster, 
from  which  hung  little  pinches  of  reddish  cow's 
hair,  and  darker  knobs  where  some  bygone  cap- 
tive, furious  or  jocose,  had  flung  his  quids  to 
dry.  It  was  a  doleful  room.  It  was  perhaps  the 
worst  place  on  earth,  for  a  woodsman  who  had 
always  gone  free,  to  sit  in  and  be  reminded  of  the 
spring. 

"Don't  you  go  nigh  it  no  more."  One  self 
spoke  to  the  other  self;  and  weary  of  their  end- 
less wrangle  night  and  day  Salem  crouched,  elbows 
on  knees,  to  glare  downward.  "You  keep  away 
from  that  winder." 

He  knew  little  about  towns  or  difference  of 
neighborhood,  nothing  about  what  he  called 
lock-up  houses.  This  ramshackle  den,  long 
scandalous  to  many  decent  persons,  and  soon  to 
be  pulled  down,  he  thought  was  devised,  main- 
tained so  throughout  ages  for  a  peculiar  torment 


3o  THE  WINTER  BELL 

and  disgrace.  Outside  his  window  lived  the  scum 
of  the  river,  wharf-rat  men  and  women ;  to  Salem, 
in  the  modesty  of  ignorance,  they  were  his  fel- 
lows, his  equals,  mankind  gathered  against  him 
terribly  in  judgment. 

He  glared  down  between  his  feet,  seeing  a 
black  depth  and  hating  this  mankind. 

What  had  happened  before,  and  what  he  sat 
dreading  most,  now  happened  again.  The  dim 
light  above  him  fluttered.  He  looked  up  quickly 
and  watched,  as  before,  vague  lines  of  shadow 
on  the  ceiling  join  and  divide  like  scissors. 

Then  a  voice  outside  called — the  voice  of 
someone  with  a  happy  thought — "Hey!  Le's 
go  see  the  murd'rer!" 

"Where  is  he?"  answered  another.  "Where 
they  keepin'  him?" 

"Right  over  here." 

He  knew  what  sound  would  come  next.  It 
came,  a  scrambling  and  kicking  of  boots  on  clap- 
boards. For  the  twentieth  time  that  day  the 
window  grew  dark,  and  Salem  hardened  himself 
to  meet  the  stare  of  another  enemy.  Hands 
gripped  the  bars;  a  head,  black  against  the  patch 
of  glowing  sky,  hung  motionless  for  what  seemed 
a  long  time,  for  what  was  in  fact  so  long  that 
the  blackness  took  on   features — a  heavy  nose, 


THE  WINTER  BELL  31 

thick  lips,  and  all  the  foolish  countenance  of  a 
young  green-eyed  lout,  grinning  with  broad  teeth. 

"Hallo!"  This  thing,  like  the  others,  gave  a 
chuckle  made  somewhat  breathless  by  the  effort 
of  holding  on.  "Hey,  how's  your  neck?  It'll 
know  'fore  long  how  many  hund'ed  ye  weigh 
behind,  a-settin'  on  air." 

The  mocker  dropped  from  sight,  and  left  the 
window  clear.  Some  kind  of  playful  combat  fol- 
lowed outside,  with  bumps  and  whiskings  and 
feminine  squeaks. 

"I'll  hold  ye  up  jest  like  a  baby." 

"O-o-oh,  quit  that!" 

"Sure.  I'll  histe  ye.  Hain't  it  a  good  pow'ful 
hand?  Set  yer  pretty  little  instep  right  int'  the 
palm  of  it.     Come  on,  don't  be  scairt  o'  me." 

"Oh,  git  out,  ye  great  big  tomfool!  Some- 
b'dy'll  see  us." 

Again  the  window  became  darkened.  A  young 
woman  was  looking  in.  She  had  bright  eyes,  a 
hard  unvirtuous  face,  and  a  silly,  gurgling  laugh 
like  a  lie  in  her  throat.  While  she  gazed  as  into 
the  den  of  a  wild  beast,  pretending  fear,  her  eyes 
beheld  nothing  and  cared  less,  for  they  soon 
turned  to  cast  their  distracted  light  outward  and 
down,  in  leers  of  false  merriment,  sham  affection. 

"Oh,"  she  cried  pertly,  "ain't  he  horruble?" 


J 


32  THE  WINTER  BELL 

The  word  expressed  what  Salem  was  thinking 
of  her. 

"You  quit  that !  Le'  go !  Behave !  I'll  sock 
you  one!'* 

Her  flushed  face  was  gone,  the  room  brighter 
for  its  absence. 

"Look  's  if  he'd  like  to  murder  us  too,"  said 
her  voice. 

"Set-fire  'f  he  don't!"  the  other  agreed.  "Haw, 
haw!" 

The  pair  moved  away,  dallying.  Salem  heard 
their  empty  jokes,  watched  their  shadows  wheel 
across  the  plaster  overhead  to  sink  among  corner 
cobwebs,  and  when  alone  once  more  fell  back 
into  his  brooding  rage.  The  last  few  days  had 
taught  him  what  mankind  was  like;  yes,  and 
womankind.  They  came  to  look  at  him  for 
sport.  He  sat  here  with  his  griefs,  "like  a 
passel  o*  baboons  in  a  cage,"  he  told  himself, 
while  other  baboons  came  and  grinned  at  him  all 
day.  This  latest  couple  had  seemed  the  worst; 
he  could  bear  no  more  of  them ;  and  now  as  time 
went  slowly  by  the  silence  failed  to  bring  comfort, 
because  at  any  moment  they  might  break  it  again. 
His  mind  was  all  one  raw  place  that  winced  in 
expectation.  Or  if  he  made  a  struggle  to  forget, 
then  began  once  more  that  wrangling  of  one  self 


THE  WINTER  BELL  33 

with  the  other.  Salem  had  never  known  before 
that  there  were  two  of  him.  Misfortune,  like  a 
wedge  in  a  block,  had  split  the  man's  fibre,  which, 
being  hard  and  clean,  therefore  parted  groaning. 
He  tried  to  rejoin  the  divided  halves;  but  when 
by  pure  will  he  succeeded  and  held  himself  to- 
gether, it  was  only  to  think;  and  thought  which 
did  not  bear  on  action,  which  led  toward  nothing 
simple  and  direct  to  be  done  at  once,  chafed 
against  every  torn  habit  of  his  life  with  intol- 
erable pain. 

"Nothin'  don't  seem  to  fit  no  more,"  said 
Salem. 

The  light  on  the  ceiling  faded,  in  time,  then 
took  a  new  direction,  and  brightened.  He  knew 
these  changes.  Early  afternoon  had  dragged 
past,  late  afternoon  slowly  swung  toward  eve- 
ning. He  was  beginning  to  hope  there  would  be 
no  more  visitors  that  day. 

uEv'body  in  town  must  'a'  seen  me  by  now." 

But  the  raw  place  had  still  to  be  prodded. 
More  quietly  than  was  usual,  without  kicking  of 
clapboards  or  preparatory  joking,  someone  else 
had  come.  Two  big  freckled  fists  laid  hold  of 
the  bars,  and  like  a  freckled  moon  with  rays  of 
pale  red  hair  a  face  heaved  up  its  chin  over  the 
sill. 


34  THE  WINTER  BELL 

"Listen  here,  boy." 

It  was  the  faithless  friend,  Trapper  Kingcome. 

"They  tolt  me  you  wouldn'  hear  o'  no  lawyer," 
he  whispered.  "That  right,  Sale?  Got  ye  a 
lawyer  yit?" 

Salem  answered  only  with  a  long  look. 

"You  git  ye  one,"  said  Trapper,  in  wheedling 
tones.  "Don't  go  playin'  the  off  ox  like  that. 
Nob'dy'll  believe  ye,  alon\  You  git  ye  a  good 
lawyer,  'fore  to-morrer." 

Salem  sprang  up,  caught  his  bench  by  the  end, 
and  swung  it  like  a  weapon. 

"You  put!"  he  growled. 

He  took  only  one  step  forward;  there  were 
bars  between  them;  the  stout  Charley  Kingcome 
was  no  coward;  but  something  deadly  in  the  fire 
of  Salem's  eyes  made  him  drop  from  the  window 
as  for  dear  life.  Salem  turned,  replaced  the 
bench,  and  sat  down  without  another  word. 

For  a  while  he  heard  Trapper's  voice,  beyond 
the  wall.  He  took  no  heed  of  what  the  man 
might  be  saying.  What  had  been  said  was  enough, 
and  remained  there  like  a  persistent  echo  in  the 
darkness. 

"Nob'dy'll  believe  ye." 

It  was  enough.     All  men  were  liars. 

Silence    followed;    probably    a    long    silence, 


THE  WINTER  BELL  35 

for  his  wrists — and  they  were  not  those  of 
a  weakling — began  to  ache  like  the  head  which 
they  supported.  A  horsefly,  the  earliest  of  the 
year,  buzzed  round  the  room,  tapped  the  wall 
with  light  rasping  touches,  and  made  its  aimless- 
ness  a  part  of  the  world's  vacancy.  Toward  sun- 
set, this  too  fell  quiet. 

Afterward,  from  outside,  there  suddenly  rose 
a  brief  grating  and  thumping,  as  of  some  hollow 
object  that  was  dragged  along  the  ground. 

"Hallo!"  someone  hailed  from  above  the 
window.      "What  ye  doin'   down  there  ?" 

It  was  the  drawl  of  old  Denny,  who  kept  the 
lock-up  house  and  dwelt  overhead.  Jailer,  pound- 
master,  and  mild  bugbear  of  truants  from  school, 
he  was  known  to  look  on  his  duties  with  a  blear- 
eyed  philosophical  neglect,  through  haze  from  a 
black  Woodstock  pipe.  Salem  could  hear  the  rat- 
tletrap balcony  creak  under  his  deliberate,  stock- 
ing-footed tread. 

"What  ye  doin'  with  that  box  bigger' n  your- 
self?" 

From  below,  after  a  pause,  came  an  answer. 

"I  only  wanted  to  see  Mr.  Delaforce,"  said  a 
young  and  rather  timid  voice. 

"Well,  you  better  hyper  horn',"  replied  the  old 
smoker  aloft.     A  loud  sucking  noise  interrupted 


36  THE  WINTER  BELL 

his  counsel,  and  a  burnt  match  dropped  aslant  past 
the  window.  "Be'n  too  many  of  ye,  guess.  He 
don't  want  to  see  no  more.  Be'n  pestered  plenty 
enough  t'-day.  You  jest  kite  along  and  let  him 
stay  put." 

The  dialogue  seemed  to  end.  But  inside  his 
dirty  room  a  thing  was  happening  to  Salem  which 
he  could  not  understand.  All  day  long  he  had 
suffered  because  this  careless  jailer  would  not 
drive  his  tormentors  away;  he  had  renounced  the 
world  with  every  person  in  it;  but  now  he  found 
himself  under  the  abhorred  window,  straining  up- 
ward, and  calling  out. 

"Let  her  come !"  he  cried.  "You  never  stopped 
the  others,  Denny.  Let  her  come!  Treat  me 
fair.     She's  the  first  one  who  hain't  called  me — " 

He  choked,  and  stood  breathing  hard,  his  arms 
raised,  his  fists  trembling  against  the  daylight. 
Presently  the  old  man  grumbled  overhead,  and 
stumped  away.  Again  the  box  drew  near,  grat- 
ing hollow  on  pebbles.  A  child,  or  someone  light 
and  small  as  a  child,  mounted  it;  pale  brown  fin- 
gers rested  on  the  sill;  and  then  a  head  younger 
than  his  own  looked  down  at  him,  calmly. 

This  late  comer  was  a  girl.  The  evening  sun 
which  poured  across  the  front  of  the  jail  glowed 
on  her  right  cheek  and  darkened  the  left  with 


•    ••.»»»•  •    » 


"Good   evening,   Mr.   Delaforce,"   she   said   gravely.     "How 
do  you  do  ?" 


THE  WINTER  BELL  37 

shadow.  Tucked  between  her  lips  for  conve- 
nience in  hauling  or  climbing,  and  forgotten,  a 
dandelion  shone  like  a  disk  of  clear  flame.  Her 
eyes,  dark  blue,  regarded  him  steadily,  but  with 
an  inward  sparkle,  a  widening  thrill  of  enforced 
courage  or  of  conquered  fear. 

"Good  evening,  Mr.  Delaforce,"  she  said 
gravely.     "How  do  you  do?" 

Salem  could  see  her  only  from  the  throat  up, 
yet  he  felt  certain  the  child  was  very  small,  and 
too  old  for  her  years.  Her  face — thin,  pale 
under  a  first  coat  of  tan — had  a  mingled  look  at 
variance  with  itself,  both  alert  and  sad,  the  look 
of  a  youngster  who  has  run  wild.  Or  perhaps  the 
wildness  lay  in  her  hair,  bright  on  the  side  toward 
the  sun,  bronze  throughout  the  shadowy  half,  and 
all  tangled. 

"You're  the  first  one,"  declared  Salem,  "to 
call  me  Mister  anything." 

She  removed  the  dandelion,  threw  it  away,  and 
grimacing,  rubbed  its  bitter  milk  from  her  lips. 
The  action  showed  a  thin  little  hand,  rough  with 
work,  badly  chapped. 

"Why  am  I?"  she  asked. 

"The  rest  of  'em,"  replied  Salem,  frowning, 
"call  me  nothin'  but  murd'rer.  Been  hearin'  it 
all  day.     'Le's  go  see  the  murd'rer.'  " 


38  THE  WINTER  BELL 

The  child  seemed  lost  in  meditation. 

"Are  you?" 

Salem  drew  back  somewhat,  to  give  her  a  bet- 
ter light  upon  his  worn,  hairy  face. 

"What  do  you  think?"  he  inquired. 

While  waiting  he  doubted  if  the  child  might 
not  be  a  cripple.  Her  dark  blue  eyes,  under  their 
heavy  and  fine-curved  lids,  contained  that  deep 
beauty  of  thoughtfulness  granted  often  to  the 
eyes  of  the  deformed.  They  looked  through  him, 
slow,  impartial. 

"No,"  she  said. 

Salem  nodded  at  her  quickly. 

"No!"  He  repeated  the  word  with  delight, 
as  if  it  were  a  thing  to  be  proud  of.  "No,  you 
bet  you !" 

They  remained  studying  each  other  for  a  while, 
without  speaking. 

"Thank  ye,  little  girl,  for  comin'  to  see  a  f el- 
law.    You  done  me  a  heap  o'  good." 

The  sadness  in  her  eyes  had  not  altered. 

"I  don't  know  much."  His  visitor  paused,  evi- 
dently casting  about  in  her  mind.  "I  wish  I  did. 
But  it  does  say,  'Thy  rod  and  thy  staff  they  com- 
fort me.'  " 

Salem  shook  his  head. 

"You  can't  tell  me  nothin'  about  the  rod,"  he 


THE  WINTER  BELL  39 

answered  gruffly.  "It's  three-cornered  whale- 
bon'  pickled  in  brine,  and  laid  on  hit  or  miss.  I 
hope  you  won't  never  come  to  feel  it,  young  one." 

After  she  had  gone  he  regretted  the  speech;  no 
use,  he  thought,  in  talking  so  to  a  child.  But 
she  had  gone  quickly,  dropping  with  a  "good-by," 
and  running  off.  Salem  hauled  himself  to  the 
window,  from  one  edge  of  which  he  caught,  past 
the  other,  no  more  than  half  a  glimpse  of  her. 
Not  a  cripple;  she  ran  fast — a  slight  figure  in 
black,  taller  than  he  had  expected  her  to  be — and 
slipped  through  the  open  door  of  a  house  across 
the  way.  He  could  see  only  half  the  house.  It 
was  a  small,  unpainted,  slatternly  building,  banked 
round  the  sill,  not  with  fir  branches  but  with  a 
trough  of  hemlock  slabs  and  shingle  shavings.  The 
door  closed. 

"Poor  little  critter,"  thought  Salem.  "Her 
folks  can't  be  no  good.  Tell  f'm  the  looks  of  it. 
They'll  leave  their  bankin'  on  all  summer." 

While  he  hung  there  he  found  to  his  great 
surprise  that  a  change  had  taken  him  unaware. 
Something  in  his  head,  like  a  spring  wound  tight 
to  the  breaking  point,  had  loosened  and  freed  with 
a  rush.  The  evening  air  tasted  wonderfully  sweet 
and  fresh.  Sunset  flooded  that  dismal  alley  by  the 
river,  poured  through  and  flowed  over  the  ugliest 


4o  THE  WINTER  BELL 

things  in  splendor.  On  the  wharves  lumber  shone 
like  pile  on  pile  of  gold,  straight  edged,  clean 
as  its  own  warm  scent,  and  mirrored  in  the  dark 
shore  water  that  between  wharves  covered  the 
mud  flats  with  a  still  pool,  brown  as  tea.  Out  in 
mid-stream  lay  the  soft  color  of  the  sky. 

He  let  go  and  sank  back  into  the  dusk. 

"Maybe  I'll  swamp  a  ro'd  out  through  this 
mess  yit,"  thought  Salem.  "Tomorrer's  goin'  to 
be  bad.     But  don't  ye  flinch  no  more." 

He  sat  down,  and  thinking,  felt  sorry  for  two 
mistakes.  He  had  driven  Trapper  away,  when 
Trapper  no  doubt  meant  kindly;  and  he  had  for- 
gotten just  now  to  ask  the  child  her  name. 


IV 


He  did  indeed  confront  the  next  day  without 
flinching.  It  was  to  be  his  second  ordeal  in  the 
court  room.  On  Monday  he  had  watched  the 
jury  being  impaneled  and  sworn,  and  heard  Judge 
Knowlton,  a  white-haired  gentleman  with  quiet, 
leisurely  manners,  adjourn  the  court  over  Tues- 
day, saying  that  he  had  to  attend  a  funeral,  and 
instructing  jury  and  witnesses  to  be  present  at  ten 
o'clock  on  Wednesday  morning. 

The  hour  appointed  thus  found  Salem  in  the 
dock,  composed,  not  hopeful,  but  willing  to  be- 
lieve that  truth  might  prevail.  Or  so  he  felt  for 
a  moment,  until  bad  air,  the  buzz  which  followed 
his  appearance,  and  the  host  of  watching  eyes 
made  his  head  swim.  The  court  room  was  dark 
and  small.  The  oldest  public  room  in  town,  it 
had  been  a  church,  built  during  the  days  when 
faith  came  first  in  clearing  a  village  out  of  the 
woods,  afterward  outgrown  and  desecrated.  Along 
the  gray  side  walls  high  narrow  windows  rose 
each  to  a  point  in  a  two-foot-deep  recess.  Men 
and  boys,  their  feet  dangling  above  the  crowd, 
stuffed  these  little  alcoves  tightly  so  that  no  draft 

41 


42  THE  WINTER  BELL 

came  in,  though  the  lower  panes  had  been  swung 
open.  Under  the  dangling  boots  all  space  was 
packed  level  with  heads,  close  fitted,  like  black 
and  white  seeds  in  a  sunflower.  A  thick,  warm 
smell  rose  from  old  rubber  matting  in  the  aisles, 
a  stale  counter-irritant  from  old  woodwork 
steeped  in  tobacco  smoke.  This  might  be  the 
odor  of  the  law,  Salem  thought  vaguely,  for  as 
a  boy  he  once  had  smelled  it  hanging  about  a  law- 
yer's office.  There  were  too  many  eyes  for  com- 
fort. He  tried  to  meet  them,  but  they  were  too 
many,  too  fixed,  and  too  hostile. 

Ignoring  them  therefore,  Salem  looked  toward 
the  judge,  who  impended  aloft,  waiting  and  rub- 
bing his  chin  thoughtfully  with  slender  fingers. 
He  seemed  a  venerable  scholar  fct  his  desk,  bowed 
down  with  the  weight  of  this  awful  moment.  As 
a  matter  of  fact  Judge  Knowlton  sat  there  tired, 
thinking  of  an  old  friend  he  had  helped  to  bury 
yesterday. 

The  buzzing  died  away.  The  roomful  settled 
into  expectancy.  His  glance  roving  about  the 
field  of  eyes  again,  Salem  encountered  one  pair 
that  wished  him  no  harm.  Midway  in  the  throng, 
wedged  uncomfortably,  a  vast,  round  old  man 
wearing  a  mop  of  red-golden  hair  and  beard,  both 
somewhat  grizzled,  regarded  Salem  with  a  be- 


THE  WINTER  BELL  43 

nignant  glare.  He  was  eating  what  might  have 
been  an  apple,  but  his  big  paw  hid  most  of  it. 
Salem  had  never  seen  the  man  before.  He  had 
a  great  chuckle  nose,  a  wind-blown,  weather-beaten 
air,  and  eyes  pale  and  clear  as  a  goat's.  Next 
moment  he  gave  Salem  a  shock  by  winking  at 
him. 

Through  the  crowded  windows  came,  like  elfin 
trumpets  heralding  the  spring,  a  faint  blast  of 
cockcrow,  repeated  from  barnyard  to  barnyard 
round  the  outskirts  of  the  town. 

Judge  Knowlton  folded  his  hands,  looked  up, 
and  said  as  though  resuming  a  late  conversation, 
"In  the  case  of  The  People  against  Delaforce,  are 
you  ready  to  proceed,  gentlemen?" 

Immediately  a  tall  man  in  black  serge  rose 
from  a  table  below  the  judge,  tossed  a  lock  of 
dark  hair  back  from  his  forehead,  and  replied, 
<rReady  for  The  People,  Your  Honor." 

Salem  viewed  this  champion  closely  after  he 
sat  down.  He  looked  earnest  and  sombre;  hun- 
gry hollows  lurked  underneath  his  cheek  bones 
and  jaw,  and  his  Adam's  apple  showed  like  the 
breast  bone  of  a  plucked  fowl. 

"Observe,"  said  the  judge,  "that  the  defendant 
has  formerly  stated  that  he  does  not  desire  coun- 
sel.   Are  you  ready  to  proceed?" 


44  THE  WINTER  BELL 

Salem,  who  felt  lonely  and  detached,  found 
with  alarm  that  everyone  was  waiting  for  him  to 
answer  the  question.  He  cleared  his  throat.  It 
was  as  dry  as  touchwood. 

"Ready  or  not,"  he  replied,  "I  told  ye,  sir,  I 
didn't  want  no  lawyers  mullm'  round." 

"Very  well,  gentlemen,"  said  Judge  Knowlton, 
"proceed." 

The  effort  of  speaking  at  such  length,  for  the 
first  time  in  his  life,  before  a  crowd,  left  Salem 
bewildered.  He  saw  the  tall  man  in  black  rise 
again,  and  heard  him  begin  with  sonorous  delib- 
eration. 

"Your  Honor,  and  gentlemen  of  the  jury " 

What  immediately  followed  was  lost  on  Salem, 
who  remained  hot  and  cold  by  turns,  dizzy  with 
the  labor  of  his  few  desperate  words.  In  time, 
however,  he  grew  conscious  that  the  many-eyed 
monster  was  watching  and  listening  elsewhere. 
Thought  and  sight  returned  to  him.  Opposite, 
not  far  away,  sat  two  ranks  of  men  whose  faces 
differed  from  the  others,  being  set,  stiffened,  like 
masks  of  unnatural  wisdom  or  good  behavior. 
He  suddenly  knew  them  for  the  jury.  On 
Monday  he  had  watched  them  gather  one  by 
one,  and  answer  some  question  about  prejudice, 
murder,  circumstantial  evidence.  The  tall  man  was 


THE  WINTER  BELL  45 

addressing  them,  though  peering  over  their  heads, 
as  if  his  words  to  be  collected  were  midges  in  the 
air,  and  his  eyesight  doubtful. 

" that  on  the  tenth  day  of  Feb'uary  the 

dead  body  of  Asa  Beard  was  found  on  the  ice  on 
Jacob-Staff  Lake ;  that  the  body  bore  the  mark  of 
a  heavy  blow,  dealt  with  some  blunt  inst'ment, 
above  the  right  ear,  crushing  the  skull;  that  near 
by  was  found  an  axe  belonging  to  the  defendant; 
and  that  the  tracks  of  snowshoes  in  the  crust  lead- 
ing from  the  spot  where  Asa  Beard's  body  laid, 
were  followed  to  a  camp  which  was  the  defend- 
ant's domicile.  We  will  also  call  before  you,  gen- 
tlemen, witnesses  to  prove  that  Asa  Beard  and 
the  defendant  quarreled,  some  time  previous  to 
the  crime,  and  come  to  blows,  over  a  dog  belong- 
ing to  the  defendant;  that  the  defendant  openly 
threatened  to  kill  Asa  Beard  on  condition  of  a 
certain  event  happening,  namely,  if  any  harm 
came  to  his  dog;  and  that  this  condition  was  ful- 
filled just  previous  to  the  murder.  These  are  the 
bare  facts.  They  are  the  facts  which  we  sh'll 
prove." 

Uttering  his  last  word  with  force,  the  tall  man 
turned  aside,  held  up  one  finger  and  beckoned. 
His  movement  made  Salem  aware  of  another 
group  in  the  crowd.     This  was  no  mob,  after  all, 


46  THE  WINTER  BELL 

but  an  ordered  thing  put  in  motion  against  him. 
Four  men,  their  faces  brick-red  among  the  haze 
of  paler  town  complexions,  waited  in  a  row. 
Salem  at  first  thought  them  blushing  with  em- 
barrassment; then  he  recognized  them — old  out- 
door acquaintances,  disguised  in  their  Sunday 
clothes.  One  of  them  answered  the  tall  man's 
finger  and  stepped  up  behind  a  brown  railing,  well 
polished  by  hand, 

" and  nothing  but  the  truth,"  concluded 

somebody,  "so  help  you  God?" 

Yes,  it  was  all  ordered.  It  grew  solemn.  This 
room  hadn't  quit  being  a  church. 

"What  is  your  name?" 

"Helon  Fox." 

"What  is  your  occupation?" 

"Lumberman." 

This  man's  face,  before,  had  looked  out  from 
a  dyed  sheepskin  collar,  over  a  sled  stake,  among 
snow-covered  alders  at  Corporation  House. 

"Where  were  you  on  the  morning  of  the  tenth 
day  of  Feb'uary  last?" 

"Crossin'  Jake-Staff  Lake,  sir." 

"Were  you  alone?" 

"No,  sir."  The  red-faced  man  gave  a  gulp, 
seized  the  railing,  and  pondered.  "No,  sir;  I 
wa'n't  alon'.     No." 


THE  WINTER  BELL  47 

"Who  was  with  you?" 

"Depatty  Shariff  Crosby  was  with  me.  And 
a  bay  hoss  and  sled  belongin'  to  Bales  MeCath- 
erine." 

The  dark  champion  of  the  people  brought  forth 
his  next  question  very  slowly. 

"Did  you  discover  anything  laying  on  the  ice 
on  that  date?" 

"We  did,  sir,"  replied  the  witness. 

"What  was  it?" 

Mr.  Helon  Fox,  lumberman,  had  no  doubt 
what  it  was;  with  the  aid  of  questioning  he  de- 
scribed it  fully. 

"Did  you  find  anything  else  ?" 

"Yes,  sir.  In  clearin'  away  to  chop  him  out 
we  found  a  axe  'longside  of  him  under  the  snow." 

The  district  attorney  bent  toward  the  table  and 
handed  over  a  light,  single-bitted  axe. 

"Is  this  it?" 

"Yes,  sir." 

"How  do  you  know  it  is?" 

Mr.  Fox  became  wary,  turned  the  axe  over 
in  his  hands  more  than  once,  then  became  cheer- 
ful again. 

"Because  the's  his  nishuals  branded  on  the 
helve." 

"You  mean  that  those  are  the  defendant's  ini- 
tials?" 


48  THE  WINTER  BELL 

"Yes,  they  be.  He  lent  her  to  me  one  time. 
S.  D.  Them  is  his  proper  nishuals  that  I  seen 
afore.    S.  for  Sale  and  D.  for  Delaforce." 

There  followed  more  questions  and  answers, 
but  the  drift  of  them  Salem  disregarded,  for  as 
he  heard  Fox  tell  of  bear's  paw  snowshoe  prints, 
and  of  Sagamore's  grave  under  the  firs,  room  and 
talkers  and  listeners  faded  away.  He  sat  in  a 
dream,  downcast,  homesick,  his  mind  far  from  all 
this  evil,  sadly  roaming  the  woods.  Once  he 
looked  up,  recalled  by  'the  sound  of  his  own 
name. 

"Mr.  Delaforce, "  the  judge  was  asking,  "do 
you  wish  to  cross-examine  the  witness?" 

"What's  that  mean,  sir?"  replied  Salem. 

He  spoke  without  fear,  being  so  remote.  His 
heart  was  not  there. 

"Have  you  any  questions  to   ask  him?" 

"No,  thank  ye." 

Homesickness  wrapped  him  round  as  if  to  hide 
him  from  view.  Another  of  the  sunburnt  four 
mounted  the  stand;  Crosby,  the  deputy  sheriff, 
who  had  worn  a  black  bearskin  coat  that  winter 
afternoon.  The  talk  went  on,  the  same  vain  repe- 
tition. 

"Was  Asa  Beard  dead  when  you  found  him?" 

"He  certain'y  was,"  declared  Crosby.    "A  corp 


THE  WINTER  BELL  49 

some  hours,  and  froze  hard  too.    I've  seen  good 
many." 

The  next  of  the  four,  Pum's  father,  old  Red- 
man of  Wing  Dam,  gave  trouble  by  his  vague- 
ness. But  he  told  a  fair  story,  how  on  "Lamb- 
kill  Hake  last  October,  November  mebbe,  Sale 
there  did  fight  with  Asy  Beard,  no  mistake  .  .  . 
Yes,  sir;  that's  a  fact  too.  Sale  did  ondeniably, 
right  out,  promise  Asy  Beard  to  kill  him  some  day, 
nex'  time  he  ever  attackted  the  dog." 

When  the  fourth  and  last  witness  appeared, 
Salem  felt  a  change  like  some  breath  of  air.  Pum 
Redman  came  lounging  into  confinement  and  took 
his  oath  like  a  shy,  fierce  young  animal,  half 
gawky,  half  graceful,  that  had  wound  from  among 
trees  into  a  circus  tent,  smelled  things  it  hated, 
and  would  quickly  wind  out  again.  The  light 
of  his  eyes  drifted  round  to  seek  or  give  offense. 
Now  Pum  was  a  gentle  soul;  and  Salem,  knowing 
him,  knew  that  here  stood  a  hot,  angry  friend  in 
the  hour  of  need. 

"What  is  your  name?" 

"Y'ought,"  said  Pum,  "to  remember  me  pooty 
well  by  now." 

"What  is  your  name?" 

"You  go  to  grass!" 

Hearing  this  defiance,  Judge  Knowlton  sat  up. 


So  THE  WINTER  BELL 

"Young  man,"  he  said  not  unkindly,  "I  call 
your  attention  to  the  fact  that  if  you  don't  answer 
these  questions  you  render  yourself  liable  to  pun- 
ishment. You  are  called  on  to  testify,  and  must 
testify,  and  if  you  don't  the  court  will  order  you 
sent  to  jail  for  contempt  until  you  do.  By  refusing 
to  answer  now  you  do  no  good  to  yourself  or  any- 
one else,  but  only  hinder  the  course  of  justice." 

Pum's  face  turned  surly  toward  his  examiner. 

"What  is  your  name?" 

"Pomeroy  Redman."  He  ground  it  out  in  a 
rage. 

"Were  you  present  at  Lambkill  Heath  last 
October  or  November,  when  two  men  had  a  fight 
there?" 

"Yes,  I  was.     I  was  on  Lambkill  Hake." 

"What  took  place  there  at  that  time?" 

Pum  was  holding  an  inward  fight  of  his  own 
against  passion. 

"We  all  know  what  you're  after!"  he  cried. 
"Yes,  I  seen  Sale  Delaforce  lick  Asy  Beard  good 
and  clean  and  plenty.  He  knocked  him  ten  foot 
through  cramb'ry  bog  with  one  poke.  And  tolt 
him  if  he  ever  did  that  to  his  dog  again  he'd  kill 
him.  W'ich  he  deserved,  the  big  ov'grown  pis- 
mire— if  he  is  dead!" 

There  came  a  pause  after  this  outburst.     The 


THE  WINTER  BELL  51 

man  in  black  serge  waited  calmly,  then  took  from 
his  pocket  a  black  leathern  strap  with  a  brass 
buckle  and  half  a  dozen  brass  bosses. 

"Did  you  ever  see  this  article  before?"  he 
said. 

"Yes,"  growled  Pum,  "I  hev." 

"Where  did  you  last  see  it?" 

"They  took  it  out  of  Sale's  pocket  when  they 
'rested  him." 

"Did  you  ever  see  it  before  that?" 

"Yes,  I  did." 

"When,  and  where?" 

"Lots  o'  times.  Round  the  dog's  neck.  Where 
s'pose?" 

"On  the  neck  of  the  defendant's  dog?" 

"Round  it,  yes." 

The  district  attorney  laid  Sagamore's  collar  on 
the  table  beside  the  axe.  He  did  so  with  a  quiet 
air  of  content. 

But  meanwhile,  behind  him,  signs  of  disturbance 
had  risen.  Looking  where  others  looked,  Salem 
saw  a  large,  round  back  rolling  away  through  the 
press,  heaving  people  to  one  side  and  the  other, 
moving  in  half  circles  like  an  up-ended  barrel.  It 
was  the  tight-clothed  back  and  mop  head  of  the 
old  man  who  had  winked  at  him,  and  who  was 


52  THE  WINTER  BELL 

now  evidently  shoving  his  way  outdoors  in  dis- 
gust. 

uPumps  have  sucked,"  proclaimed  his  resound- 
ing voice.  "Jury?  A  bo'tlo'd  of  dodunks  and 
chowderheads,  wouldn't  know  a  man  if  they 
saw  him  born.    Look  at  'em.    They'll  find  guilty." 

Judge  Knowlton  spoke  from  his  bench. 

"Mr.  Bailiff,  go  get  that  man  and  bring  him 
back  here." 

Many  persons  in  the  room  guessed  what  was 
passing  through  the  judge's  mind.  He  knew  this 
offender.  Everyone  knew  and  liked  old  Captain 
Constantine,  a  rich  eccentric  who,  retired  from 
the  sea  into  a  fortune,  thought  little  of  shore 
ways  and  would  utter  his  mind  aloud  anywhere, 
contradicting  even  his  favorite  parson  in  church. 
Yesterday  Knowlton  had  borne  the  head  of  a 
coffin  with  him,  had  seen  tears  in  the  captain's 
eyes;  but  now  it  was  the  judge,  not  the  friend, 
that  spoke  to  a  culprit  at  the  rail,  whose  arm 
was  held  by  the  sheriff. 

uThe  court  judges  you  guilty  of  contempt,  and 
fines  you  two  hundred  and  fifty  dollars,  and  orders 
that  you  pay  the  fine  forthwith  or  remain  in  the 
custody  of  the  sheriff  till  the  fine  is  paid." 

Captain  Constantine  chose  quickly.  He  gave 
the  sheriff  a  brown  derby  hat  to  hold,  as  if  hang- 


THE  WINTER  BELL  53 

ing  it  on  a  convenient  peg.  With  one  of  his 
circular,  muscle-bound  movements,  plunging  hand 
and  wrist  down  inside  his  tight  coat,  he  strug- 
gled awhile,  then  hauled  out  a  long,  fat  leathern 
pocketbook,  dark  and  shiny  as  a  saddle.  A  bright 
brown  tarred  spun  yarn  lashed  this  wallet  se- 
curely together.  Like  magic  the  captain  untied 
some  private  complication  of  knots,  withdrew  a 
strap  from  several  keepers,  napped  the  cover 
open,  wet  his  thumb,  and  peeled  off  one  after 
another  of  fresh  green  bank  notes,  which  he  care- 
fully shoved  endlong  upon  the  desk. 

"Well  worth  it,"  he  declared  in  a  genial  grum- 
ble. 

"I  warn  you,"  said  the  judge,  "to  be  careful." 

The  old  irrepressible,  tying  his  wallet  and 
ramming  it  home  again,  looked  quite  unabashed 
and  happy. 

"Sir,  for  your  court,"  he  boomed,  "I  have 
nothin'  but  the  greatest  respect.  More  than 
ever.  And  for  good  discipline  gen'ally.  I  make 
my  apologies  to  all  consarned." 

He  was  allowed  to  depart,  and  did  so,  again 
swaying  through  the  crowd  like  a  barrel  on  its 
chime.  Salem  watched  him  go  with  a  queer  re- 
gret, as  if  this  stranger  were  carrying  away  the 


54  THE  WINTER  BELL 

last  of  any  good,  anything  to  be  hoped  for  or  re- 
membered. 

"That  is  the  case  for  The  People,  Your 
Honor." 

Salem  turned  to  find  the  judge  looking  at  him, 
and  saying  as  before,  "Do  you  wish  to  ask  the 
witness  any  questions?" 

He  had  forgotten  Pum,  who  stood  chafing  be- 
hind the  brown  rail. 

"No,  thank  ye." 

With  that  lanky  wildcat  grace  of  his,  Pum 
slipped  free  of  the  law's  cage  and  down  among 
his  outdoor  fellows  again. 

"Have  you  any  testimony  to  offer?" 

"No,  sir." 

Judge  Knowlton  tried  to  do  his  best  by  this 
prisoner,  whose  haggard,  scrubby  cheeks  and 
bronze  profile  reminded  him  of  a  young  Job  in 
the  ashes,  a  Job  who  had  renounced  his  Maker. 
The  boy  needed  every  chance. 

"Mr.  Dela force,  have  you  no  statement  to 
make?" 

Salem  wavered.  He  could  not  let  his  life  go 
thus  without  an  effort,  but  he  did  not  know  what 
effort  or  how  to  begin.  This  old  gentleman's 
tone,  some  decency  underlying  the  bare  words, 
gave  him  courage. 


THE  WINTER  BELL  55 

"Yes,"  he  replied.     "I  have.     Think  I  have." 

uDo  you  wish  to  make  it  under  oath?" 

"All  right,  sir." 

He  stumbled  into  the  place  where  Pum  had 
been,  heard  the  clerk's  voice  and  the  name  of 
God,  waited,  saw  everyone  waiting  for  him  to 
speak,  and  grew  bewildered,  a  man  in  a  mist. 

uOn'y  want  to  say  this."  He  heard  himself 
talking  like  someone  else.  "Up  where  I  come 
from,  no  one  ever  doubted  my  word  afore.  That's 
true.  Someb'dy  stole  my  axe  on  me.  I  never 
touched  him  again,  not  after  we  had  the  fist  fight. 
Never.  If  they'd  read  them  tracks  both  ways, 
proper,  they'd  'a'  seen  I  come  fresh  up  lake  and 
found  him  layin'  there,  just  the  way  they  did." 
Salem  felt  the  obscurity  of  his  words,  a  tangle 
he  could  not  clear  away;  his  own  mind  saw  plain 
enough  the  storm  on  the  lake,  and  Asa's  hair,  a 
chunk  of  doormat  filled  with  driven  snow.  "I 
can't  seem  able  to  put  it  right.  They  wouldn't 
'a'  found  no  tracks  o'  Beard.  He  was  half  cov- 
ered a'ready." 

Salem  gave  it  up. 

"Is  that  all?"  said  Judge  Knowlton. 

"Yes,  sir,  that's  all.  I  jest  mean  to  say,  it 
don't  hang  together." 

"Is  there  to  be  any  cross-examination?" 


S6  THE  WINTER  BELL 

It  appeared  that  the  district  attorney  had  one 
question  to  ask.  He  rose,  took  the  axe  from  the 
table,  stalked  near,  and  lifted  the  handle  under 
Salem's  eyes  for  inspection. 

"Is  this  axe  yours  ?" 

"I  tolt  you  afore,"  argued  Salem,  "somebody 
went " 

"Answer  my  question,  yes  or  no,"  cut  in  his 
adversary.     "Is  this  axe  yours?" 

"Yes,  it's  mine." 

"That's  all,  Your  Honor,"  proclaimed  the 
sombre  tall  man,  and  fell  back,  nodding  to  clinch 
matters. 

The  judge  scraped  his  face  down  on  both  sides 
with  the  flat  of  his  hand. 

"Mr.  Delaforce,"  he  said,  "is  there  any  other 
witness  you  would  like  to  call  upon?" 

"No,  sir,"  replied  Salem. 

He  found  his  way  back  somehow  to  the  refuge 
of  his  chair.  The  judge's  voice  continued  from 
above. 

"Have  you  prepared  any  instructions  that  you 
desire  to  have  given  to  the  jury?" 

"I  have."  The  man  in  black  serge  handed  up 
some  papers. 

Salem  heard  the  same  question  put  to  him. 

"No,"  he  said.     "I  wouldn't  know  how." 


THE  WINTER  BELL  57 

Judge  Knowlton  regarded  a  stucco  ring  in  the 
ceiling,  a  flyspecked  ring  round  a  hook  coated 
with  lampblack  from  some  light  of  the  church, 
long  vanished. 

"Do  you  desire  to  argue  the  case?" 

"Most  assuredly,  Your  Honor,"  came  a  stal- 
wart reply. 

"Proceed,"  the  judge  told  the  ring,  "with  your 
argument." 

Upon  the  scene  then — for  Salem — entered 
chaos  and  old  night.  He  saw  the  black  champion 
rise  with  great  deliberation  and  dignity,  toss 
back  the  drooping  lock  from  his  forehead,  blow 
his  nose  in  a  loud  blast,  fold  away  his  handker- 
chief thoughtfully,  explore  the  hollow  of  each 
wrist,  and  produce  from  each  a  cylinder  of  glassy 
linen  buttoned  with  a  moss  agate,  like  armor  for 
the  back  of  his  hands.  Thus  prepared,  the  man 
seemed  a  foot  taller  than  before,  gaunt  as  a  moose. 
His  voice  became  a  bellow. 

" no  clearer  case  of  downright,  premedi- 
tated, cold-blooded  murder  in  the  first  degree  has 
ever  be'n  presented  to  a  jury  in  a  court  of  justice !" 
Like  a  roaring  gale,  the  words  left  Salem  over- 
thrown; he  could  not  follow  their  sense,  but 
hearkened  in  a  panic  of  unwilling  admiration.  "I 
will  now  pr'ceed  to  tell  you  how  each  and  every 


58  THE  WINTER  BELL 

movement  of  the  defendant  has  b'en  clearly  traced 
from  the  time  he  got  up  in  the  morning,  on  the 
day  before  the  murder,  down  to  the  time  when 
he  was  safely  landed  behind  bars,  where  he  be- 
longs. " 

The  storm  gained  headway,  but  now  and  again 
dropped  in  a  lull,  cold,  unnatural,  deadly. 

"Gentlemen,  I  have  no  need  to  remind  you  of 
this  man's  motive  for  his  turrible  act." 

The  speaker  lifted  his  hand,  to  display  poor 
Sagamore's  old  collar,  and  wave  it  in  a  gesture 
of  contempt. 

"A  dog!  Nor  do  I  need  to  remind  you  that 
many  of  the  bitt'rest  lawsoots  in  all  history,  and 
the  foulest  acts  of  bloodshed,  have  b'en  com- 
mitted on  account  of  nothing  more  than  a  dog. 
Is  it  possible  in  any  way,  shape,  or  manner,  for 
you,  gentlemen " 

Salem's  eyes  took  rest  on  the  collar  when  it  was 
laid  down  again.  He  did  not  even  try  now  to 
listen,  though  more  and  more  strange  words  beat 
upon  him,  burst  round  him. 

"The  attention  of  the  whole  civilized  world, 
I  may  say,  is  leveled  on  this  county,  from  which 
no  capital  felon  has  ever  yet  escaped  the  hang- 
man's noose.  The  men  of  this  county  are  red- 
blooded — no    mollycoddles    among    them — they 


THE  WINTER  BELL  59 

will  not  be  content  with  any  compromise.  Either 
you  must  find  the  defendant  guilty  of  murder  in 
the  first  degree,  as  he  clearly  is,  or  else  you  must 
acquit  him  and  bear  that  responsibility  for  the 
county's  disgrace  which  will  inevitably  follow 
when  the  passions  of  an  outraged  populace " 

There  was  more,  but  at  last  it  ended.  A  stir 
of  people  shifting  in  their  seats,  a  fit  of  coughing, 
passed  roundabout  the  room.  Judge  Knowlton 
waited  for  silence,  then  spoke ;  and  Salem  learned 
with  astonishment  that  the  old  gray  scholar  aloft 
sat  quite  unmoved,  still  as  a  rock. 

"Have  you  any  reply  to  this  argument?" 

Salem  rose.  Here  in  this  cave  of  language  and 
phantoms  was  one  godlike  man  who  did  not 
despise  him. 

"I  ain't  no  talker,  sir,"  he  replied.  "The  gen- 
tleman who  spoke  again'  me  is  grand,  but  he's 
made  a  mistake  somewheres.  Been  told  wrong. 
He  can  shed  words  like — like — the  way  a  car- 
penter sheds  nails  round  a  new  building,  but " 

He  meant  this  fairly,  a  serious  compliment. 
It  was  taken  for  humor.  Salem  heard  suppressed 
titters  and  saw  faces  grinning.  The  blood  rushed 
to  his  head.  Laugh,  would  they,  at  a  man  doing 
his  best,  who  knew  it  wasn't  much?  He  sat  down 
in  fury  and  despair,  crying — - 


60  THE  WINTER  BELL 

"Take  it  or  leave  it,  I  never  touched  him !" 

"Is  that  all?"  said  the  judge. 

Salem  nodded.  He  would  never  open  his 
mouth  to  them  again. 

"It  would  appear,  then,"  resumed  Judge 
Knowlton  after  a  pause,  "that  the  taking  of  testi- 
mony is  completed.  The  court  will  therefore  in- 
struct the  jury." 

He  handled  the  documents  which  the  man  in 
black  serge  had  given  him,  wiped  a  pair  of  spec- 
tacles, put  them  on,  and  for  a  long  time  sat  read- 
ing and  writing  as  though  alone. 

Salem  looked  at  the  dog's  collar  until  the 
brasses  blinked  and  made  his  eyes  ache.  Then  he 
looked  round  the  room,  too  tired  to  care  if  it 
were  full  or  empty.  At  the  rear  wall,  by  the  door, 
a  tall  stove  and  crooked  pipe  blotched  the  regular 
pattern  of  the  crowd.  He  thought  he  saw,  lurk- 
ing behind  them,  someone  he  might  have  known. 
It  did  not  matter.  The  judge  was  talking  now. 
Words  came  to  him  in  snatches. 

"Burden  of  proof  is  on  the  state  throughout 
...  to  prove  the  guilt  of  the  defendant  beyond 
a  reasonable  doubt  .  .  .  and  if  from  all  the 
evidence  you  have  heard  at  this  trial  you  have 
the  slightest  doubt  as  to  the  guilt  of  the  defendant 
it  is  your  duty  to  acquit  him.     In  other  words,  it 


THE  WINTER  BELL  61 

is  your  duty  to  acquit  him  unless  the  evidence 
has  convinced  you  of  his  guilt  beyond  a  reason- 
able doubt.  The  court  will  further  instruct  you 
as  to  the  difference  between  murder  in  the  first 
degree  and  murder  in  the  second  degree.  .  .  . 
And  the  court  will  further  instruct  you  that  by 
the  law  of  this  state,  in  the  event  that  you  shall 
render  a  verdict  of  murder  in  the  first  degree  it 
will  be  the  duty  of  the  court  to  impose  upon  the 
defendant  a  sentence  of  death." 

Salem  looked  up  for  an  instant,  then  down 
again.  His  mind  was  not  afraid  of  death,  which 
would  be  better  than  this  present  thing;  yet  at 
the  word  some  part  beyond  his  mind  or  under- 
neath it  went  numb,  like  an  elbow  hit  on  the 
crazy  bone. 

"And  if  your  verdict  shall  be  guilty  of  murder 
in  the  second  degree  it  will  be  the  duty  of  the 
court  to  sentence  the  defendant  to  imprisonment 
for  life." 

Salem  remained  in  that  tingling  stupor,  while 
the  voice  flowed  calmly  on. 

"You  are  the  judges  of  the  credibility  of  the 
witnesses,  and  it  will  be  for  you  to  determine  the 
truth  of  the  evidence  presented  .  .  .  wholly 
circumstantial,  and  if  it  does  not  as  a  whole  con- 
vince your  minds  beyond  all  doubt  that  the  de- 


62  THE  WINTER  BELL 

fendant  is  guilty  you  will  acquit  him.  ..." 
Judge  Knowlton  handed  papers  down  to  the 
clerk,  while  talking,  and  at  last  inquired:  "Do  you 
wish  to  retire,  gentlemen,  to  deliberate  upon  your 
verdict?" 

The  two  ranks  of  men  opposite  were  bobbing 
their  heads  together,  whispering.  Salem  could 
read  in  their  faces  a  troubled  importance.  Among 
them  there  spoke  up  a  mild  little  man  with  no 
hair  on  his  head. 

"I  guess,  judge,  we'd  like  to  go  t'  the  jury 
room." 

"Very  well,  gentlemen." 

They  shuffled  out,  sad  and  hampered,  like  men 
behaving  at  a  funeral.  An  officer,  the  same 
bailiff  or  sheriff  who  had  taken  Captain  Constan- 
tine's  arm,  closed  after  them  a  brown-painted  door 
in  the  wall,  and  stood  guard  beside  it  under  oath. 
Judge  Knowlton,  swinging  his  chair  halfway 
round,  plunged  into  a  thought,  a  doze,  or  some- 
thing deep  and  unhappy.  Time  went  by;  some 
boys,  weary  of  delay,  crawled  backward  off  their 
window  ledges  and  dropped  from  view  into  sun- 
shine; and  with  the  faint  increase  of  light  and 
air  thus  given,  came  drifting  another  spring  chal- 
lenge of  cockcrow. 

Salem  outstared  the  brass  bosses  on  his  dog 


THE  WINTER  BELL  63 

collar.  Let  them  blink  as  they  would  they  were 
the  last  friendly  sign  of  his  old  world,  taken  from 
him,  shortly  to  disappear.  Everything  true  and 
solid  was  melting  in  this  region  of  words. 

A  knock  sounded  on  the  door,  which  the  bailiff 
opened. 

"We  have  reached  a  verdict,"  called  a  voice 
from  behind. 

Salem  watched  the  dozen  mournful  men  troop 
in.  The  clerk  called  their  names  one  by  one.  They 
answered,  "Here."     "Here." 

The  judge  swung  back  his  chair  to  face  them. 

"Gentlemen,  have  you  determined  upon  your 
verdict?" 

"We  have,"  piped  up  the  little  bald  man. 

"What  is  your  verdict?" 

That  shining  head  became  stage-frightened  as 
the  light  was  focussed  there. 

"We  find  the  defendant "     The  foreman 

lost  his  voice. 

During  the  pause  for  recovery,  and  each  pause 
later,  Salem  had  an  impression,  false  probably, 
that  all  in  the  room  waited  thirsting  for  his 
blood. 

"We  find  the  defendant  guilty — of  murder — in 
the  second  degree." 

Afterward  he  watched  the  clerk  busily  record- 


64  THE  WINTER  BELL 

ing  this,  heard  it  read  aloud,  and  the  jury  answer- 
ing that  it  was  their  verdict.  He  heard  Judge 
Knowlton  saying: 

"Gentlemen,  the  jury  is  discharged.  The  court 
hereby  appoints  next  Saturday  morning,  April 
twenty- fourth,  at  ten  o'clock,  as  the  time  for  pro- 
nouncing judgment  on  the  defendant." 

Twice  that  day  the  court  room  was  to  be  dis- 
turbed. Of  a  sudden,  quietly,  Salem  vaulted  the 
rail  before  him,  caught  up  Sagamore's  collar  from 
the  table,  and  threw  it  over  the  heads  of  the 
crowd. 

"Hey,  Trapper!    Ketch!" 

It  flew  straight,  though  uncoiling,  his  final  mes- 
sage to  his  own.  He  had  seen  Kingcome  hiding 
behind  the  stove. 

"Trapper,"  he  cried,  "give  her  to  the  little  girl 
that  lives  opposite  the  lock — acrost  from  where  I 
seen  ye  last!" 

Charles  Kingcome,  who  had  evaded  subpoena, 
did  not  shirk  now.  The  collar  met  his  broad 
palm  in  air  and  was  engulfed. 

Salem,  vaulting  back  over  the  rail,  stood  at 
ease.    No  one  else  had  found  time  to  move. 


Of  Salem's  life  in  prison  the  divisions  had 
nothing  to  do  with  time.  There  were  few 
landmarks  in  his  calendar,  and  these  few  he  saw 
only  when  long  past  them,  as  changes  come  and 
gone  without  meaning.  Quiet  inward  changes ;  of 
outward,  he  kept  no  score. 

The  first  week  he  remembered,  because  it 
flashed  by  in  a  mist,  yet  dragged  half  a  lifetime, 
and  because  it  left  him  wonderstruck,  numb  with 
surprise.  He  had  expected  vague  horrors,  of 
which  he  could  form  no  picture  beforehand — a 
plunge  into  the  shades,  the  waters  under  the  earth ; 
but  there  came  nothing  of  the  kind,  for  after  the 
claws  of  that  public  anguish  had  done  tearing  him 
he  was  dropped  into  a  profound,  still  monotony 
which  might  almost  have  been  peace.  He  found 
himself  put  to  work  in  the  broom  factory  of  the 
prison. 

It  was  a  room  not  well  lighted,  but  rather  dim 
than  gloomy,  and  filled  with  the  pleasant  smell  of 
broom  corn,  the  rustle  of  which  perpetually  made 
a  faint,  slow  stir  in  the  stillness.  Revolving  shafts 
purred,  a  belt  lace  whipped  over  a  pulley  and 

65 


66  THE  WINTER  BELL 

snapped  in  rhythmical  repetition,  but  these  sounds 
ran  hidden  below  the  surface  of  a  general  whisper- 
ing and  hush.  At  times  the  light,  padded  thump 
of  a  machine  also  failed  to  break  this  quiet  sur- 
face. Again  and  again  in  the  days  which  followed, 
Salem  could  almost  have  thought  himself  in  a 
barn,  smelling  hay  and  hearing  the  stamp  of  a 
horse.  This  was  an  early  fancy,  however,  which 
he  soon  outlived. 

He  worked  here  for  three  years. 

In  the  beginning  he  clung  fast  by  hope.  They 
had  done  wrong  to  put  him  here ;  they  would  soon 
find  their  mistake;  therefore  they  would  soon 
come,  tell  him  so,  man  to  man,  and  let  him  go. 
Who  uthey"  were,  he  could  not  have  told;  but 
sometimes  in  thought  he  beheld  them  as  a  com- 
posite figure,  vaguely  benevolent,  regarding  him 
from  somewhat  above,  like  the  judge.  Mean- 
while he  had  only  to  conduct  himself  as  a  man. 

His  work  was  light.  At  first  he  carried  from 
storeroom  to  factory  bundle  after  bundle  of  broom 
corn,  sweet-smelling,  tidy  burdens,  the  end  of  each 
stalk  tinged  with  a  greenish  dye  that  kept  it 
fresh.  A  double  armful  weighed  as  nothing; 
forty-odd  steps  covered  the  distance  to  go  and 
return;  and  having  placed  one  load  upon  the 
long  high  table — glossy  from  the  touch  of  listless 


THE  WINTER  BELL  67 

hands  year  in,  year  out — Salem  had  only  to  get 
another  as  deliberately  as  he  chose.  The  dreary 
men  sorting  at  the  table  did  not  encourage  haste. 

"Like  bringin'  fodder  for  the  calf,"  he  thought. 

After  some  weeks  he  modified  this  view : 

"Like  bringin'  bad  fodder  for  a  sick  calf." 

He  had  discovered  three  facts:  the  work 
grew  heavier  than  lead,  the  smell  of  the  corn 
stupefying  like  a  drug;  this  apparent  peace  in  here 
was  a  stale,  rancid  thing;  and  they,  those  people 
outdoors  who  were  to  right  the  wrong,  had  for- 
gotten and  would  leave  him  here  carrying  straws 
for  ever. 

During  the  night  which  brought  this  counsel  he 
thought  he  descended  into  hell.  He  was  mis- 
taken.    It  did  not  happen  then,  but  afterward. 

Next  day  a  change  of  work  brought  relief,  or 
what  seemed  relief  at  the  time,  if  only  as  a  fresh 
grip  eases  a  broken  blister.  Salem  took  corn 
from  the  sorters  and  carried  it  to  be  bound.  His 
journeys,  no  longer  back  and  forth,  took  him  over 
a  more  varied  course,  now  near  by,  now  farther 
away,  up  and  down  lanes  of  new  faces  not  seen 
closely  before. 

Words  were  spoken  to  him,  thrown  at  him  by 
different  voices :  "Inside  hurl  here.  Outside  hurl. 
Covers.     More  inside." 


68  THE  WINTER  BELL 

Just  how  long  these  journeys  continued,  how 
many  months,  he  never  knew.     He  spent  much 
time  wondering  at  the  faces,  blaming  himself  be- 
cause hardly  one  of  them  demanded  him  to  know 
and  like  it  better.     They  looked  untrustworthy 
or  dull  or  commonplace,  or  sometimes  cruel,  but 
besides  a  uniform  pallor  there  was  a  trait  pos- 
sessed  by  too   many,   a   lack  in   the   eyes,   that 
daunted  him.    Something  was  gone  or  had  never 
been  behind  those  windows  of  the  spirit. 
"They  belong  here,  and  I  don't." 
Salem  rejected  this  thought  as  proud  and  un- 
kind; but  it  often  returned  in  other  forms.   These 
men  were  different,  he  knew.     In  the  open  air 
he  never  would  have  chosen  them  for  companions ; 
and  here,  though  starving  for  talk,  he  saw  none 
whose  look  crossed  his  own  with  the  spark  of 
honest  fellowship,  like  catching  at  like.     News 
and  gossip  ran  underground  as  forest  fire  runs 
deep  in  leaf  mold,  but  none  of  it  meant  anything 
to  Salem.     He  did  not  speak  the  language.     A 
man  told  him  so  one  day  with  scorn :    "You  don't 
know  a  con  from  a  p.k."    There  were,  it  is  true, 
lectures   and   entertainments;  but  Salem  wished 
neither  to  be  lectured  nor  to  be  entertained.    He 
desired  only  one  thing. 

A  long  time  afterward  he  was  put  to  work  a 


THE  WINTER  BELL  69 

stitching  machine  in  a  dusky  corner  close  by  an  end 
of  the  sorters'  table.  Above  his  right  hand  two 
long  hanks  of  twine,  one  orange,  one  purple,  hung 
down  and  made  the  only  spot  of  bright  color  in 
the  world.  Here,  thousands  of  times,  he  per- 
formed the  same  motion.  Clamping  an  unfinished 
broom,  round  and  witchlike,  head  uppermost,  be- 
tween the  steel  jaws  of  his  vise,  he  reached  for 
an  end  of  purple  twine,  threw  a  neat  half  hitch 
round  the  corn,  threaded  first  one,  then  the  other 
of  two  great  broad  needles,  pulled  a  lever,  and 
watched  the  needles  dart  back  and  forth  from 
their  wire-screened  concealment,  alternately  stab- 
bing a  row  of  stitches  across  the  broom,  till  he 
checked  them  at  the  proper  instant.  He  repeated 
this  with  orange  twine;  with  purple  again;  with 
orange  again;  then  removing  the  broom  he  laid 
it  on  a  pile  which  rose  beside  his  left  hand  and 
which  presently  a  fellow  prisoner  came  to  take 
away.  Salem  could  have  done  this  work  with  his 
eyes  closed. 

Beyond  his  machine,  and  below,  on  a  stool  be- 
tween the  end  of  the  long  table  and  the  wall, 
crouched  always  a  little  old  man  with  bald  head 
and  purblind,  squinting  eyes.  Nested  in  a  litter 
of  straw,  where  the  shadow  hung  darkest,  he 
worked  by  sense  of  touch,  like  a  spider,  with 


7o  THE  WINTER  BELL 

cramped  but  skillful  fingers  all  day  stripping  stems 
out  of  corn,  for  the  finer  grades  of  broom.  This 
man  had  been  there  many  years;  his  crime,  a  little 
neighborly  spite  work,  arson.  In  the  dead  of  a 
winter's  night  and  of  a  cold  forty  degrees  below 
zero,  he  had  set  fire  to  a  house  where  women 
and  children  lay  asleep.  Now  in  the  dusk  his 
bald  head  shone  glassy,  pale  yellowish  white,  as 
though  it  had  taken  the  color  of  a  broom  handle. 
His  sunken  cheeks  and  loose  evil  mouth  never 
ceased  to  writhe,  pucker,  chew  on  nothing,  yet 
maintain  a  smile.  Salem  could  not  make  out 
whether  the  smile,  which  lurked  also  in  the  down- 
cast eyes,  were  crafty  or  vacant.  As  the  old 
man  worked  he  whispered,  not  louder  than  the 
rustle  of  the  corn.  Salem  grew  capable  of  hear- 
ing the  words,  at  first  obscurely,  then  with  more 
and  more  distinctness,  and  found  them  always 
those  of  a  filthy  story  or  song.  They  had  in  them 
no  touch  of  reality,  no  humor,  nothing  but  such 
abomination  as  a  parrot  or  a  depraved  child  might 
learn  by  rote.  Much  of  this,  however,  the  crea- 
ture plainly  invented  as  he  went  along. 

Old  Deacon  Kelly 
With  a  cast-iron  belly, 
The  inside  lined  with  fat — 


THE  WINTER  BELL  71 

So  the  old  man  sang  in  his  whisper,  a  begin- 
ning of  endless,  unspeakable  fantasies. 

Outdoors  among  his  own  kind  Salem  had  often 
heard  a  spade  called  in  fun  something  more  hilari- 
ous than  a  spade;  he  knew  plenty  of  rough  talk; 
but  he  had  never  imagined  that  underneath  plain 
smut  there  were  depths  and  layers  of  sludge,  or 
that  age,  and  what  was  left  of  white  hairs,  could 
stir  it  round  and  round  for  pleasure. 

The  whisper,  just  piercing  the  rustle,  made  his 
day's  work  loathsome.  At  night  those  words  ran 
through  his  head  until  he  sometimes  doubted  if 
he  had  really  heard  them,  if  they  were  not  rather 
of  his  own  choice  and  making,  or  inspired  by  an 
unknown  beast  within  him. 

Night  was  bad  enough,  even  when  lacking  this 
residue  of  the  day.  Salem's  corridor  window 
looked  across  an  open  space,  perhaps  a  bit  of 
courtyard,  and  over  some  roof,  perhaps  another 
wing  of  the  prison,  toward  a  patch  of  sky.  It 
looked  eastward,  so  that  in  clear  weather  he 
could  lie  there,  and  by  adjusting  his  head  on  the 
pillow  watch  a  star  climb  slowly  toward  the  upper 
edge  of  the  highest  pane,  become  a  short  furred 
line  of  brightness,  and  die  out;  then  moving  his 
head,  could  bring  it  down  again,  and  again  watch 
it  draw  upward  until  he  had  fallen  asleep,  or  that 


72  THE  WINTER  BELL 

star  gone  and  another  taken  its  function.  Once 
a  black  thing,  bat  or  night  bird,  startled  him  by 
swooping  across  and  for  a  moment  blotting  this 
dreary  pastime.  It  never  came  again,  but  it  gave 
him  afterward  a  nightmare  in  which  he  seemed 
to  be  outdoors,  free,  admiring  the  handiwork  of 
the  heavens,  when  suddenly  from  beyond  the  stars 
came  a  black  pin  point  that  rushed  and  grew  and 
covered  them  all — a  runaway  world  falling  to 
crash  and  bring  the  end  of  this  one.  He  woke 
in  a  doomsday  helplessness. 

But  this  was  not  Salem's  usual  dream  or  his 
worst.  Another  had  invaded  sleep,  recurring  as 
often  as  twice  in  a  month.  He  always  found  him- 
self walking  among  woods,  in  a  fairylike  season 
blended  of  all  happiest  times  of  year  and  hours 
of  day,  incongruous  but  lovely.  Mist  covered 
the  lake,  and  far  away  loons  were  laughing;  next 
moment  in  spring  sunshine  the  water  lay  clear, 
pale  blue,  softly  glowing,  beyond  a  cove  where 
the  last  melting  slush  made  faint,  splintery  noises 
as  it  pressed  together,  dissolved  and  sank,  while 
willows  were  budding  in  the  warmest  hollows 
alongshore.  Or  else  he  passed  beneath  October 
trees  where  broad  yellow  leaves  twirled  slowly 
down,  and  twigs  of  young  moosewood,  knee-high, 
had  their  long-eared  tips  in  velvet,  like  so  many 


THE  WINTER  BELL  73 

little  buff-colored  rabbits'  heads.  He  moved 
with  great  ease  and  liberty,  his  footsteps  buoyed 
in  air,  traversing  a  midsummer  carpet  of  dwarf 
cornel  without  'bruising  one  among  all  their  red 
berries.  He  felt  a  luminous,  unearthly  joy. 
Then,  miles  away  behind  the  trees,  a  bell  began 
to  tinkle.  "Here  it  comes,',  he  thought.  The 
sound  drew  nearer.  With  it  came  foreboding, 
then  recognition,  then  despair;  and  presently  by 
one  of  those  dream  changes  neither  slow  nor 
rapid,  Salem  was  walking  in  winter  through  dry 
snow,  an  old  man.  He  went  on  and  on,  feebly, 
without  hope,  driven  by  the  wind  or  by  the  bell; 
the  snow  grew  drier  and  thinner;  he  stumbled 
over  rocks,  half  covered,  that  rolled  underfoot; 
and  these,  at  first  black,  he  found  to  be  turning 
yellow-white  and  rounded  like  bald  pates.  They 
were  the  bones  of  dead  men.  The  world  was  a 
plain  covered  with  them,  and  before  him  nothing 
but  malignance,  the  desiccation  of  death. 

This  dream — when  he  fell  asleep,  the  dread 
of  having  it;  when  he  woke,  its  truth  staring  at 
him  afresh  in  the  darkness — this  became  his  worst 
punishment. 

One  morning  after  it,  as  he  stood  at  work, 
having  just  clamped  another  broom  in  his  vise 
and  taken  the  first  half-hitch  of  purple  twine, 


74  THE  WINTER  BELL 

Salem  glanced  up  quickly  as  though  summoned. 

The  whisperer  in  the  straw  sat  idle,  watching 
him.  This  had  never  happened  before.  Salem 
could  not  remember  that  he  had  even  caught  his 
neighbor's  eye. 

The  loose  lips  were  chewing,  but  paused  to 
form  a  word: 

"Wait." 

Salem  obeyed. 

The  old  house  burner  gave  him  a  cunning  smile, 
nodded  like  one  who  read  a  face,  peered  under 
the  sorters'  table  up  and  down  the  room  with 
stealth,  and  meanwhile  fingered  something  out 
from  the  side  of  his  right  boot. 

"Here,"  he  mouthed,  and  tossed  the  thing  clev- 
erly. 

Salem  caught  and  saw  it  for  one  of  his  own 
needles,  broken,  useless,  though  still  pointed  and 
some  three  inches  long. 

He  stared  from  this  to  the  giver,  who  once  more 
smiled  and  nodded. 

"Try  that." 

Salem  could  not  understand. 

The  other  leaned  back  in  his  nest,  grinned,  and 
suddenly  with  a  fierceness  that  pulled  the  cords 
awry  under  his  chin,  drew  his  forefinger  across  his 
throat. 


THE  WINTER  BELL  75 

Salem  recoiled  In  those  purblind  eyes  that 
had  opened  wide,  full  of  fire,  he  saw  the  devil  who 
came  to  answer  his  thought.  They  drooped  and 
were  hidden.  The  old  man  fell  to  work,  stripping 
stalks  from  the  corn,  as  always,  only  now  he  for- 
got to  whisper  and  dozed  as  if  content  with  him- 
self. 

Salem  began  a  motion  to  fling  the  bodkin  at 
him  or  away.  Instead  he  paused,  wavered,  then 
stooping,  ran  it  carefully  down  between  boot  and 
ankle. 


VI 


When  Captain  Constantine  had  elbowed  his 
way  from  the  court  room  on  that  morning  so 
long  ago,  he  stood  at  the  head  of  the  stairs  alone 
and  frowned.  The  street  lay  empty,  in  a  drowse 
of  spring  sunshine  and  early  noon.  The  captain 
jammed  his  brown  derby  hat  over  his  temples  as 
if  the  stillness  had  been  a  gale,  and  with  sea  legs 
apart,  bent  at  the  knees,  remained  motionless. 
His  big  eyes,  that  when  alert  could  seem  pale 
yellow  and  clear  as  a  goat's,  were  darkened;  re- 
tired under  their  bristling  brows  and  among  puck- 
ers of  thought,  they  studied  the  ground  below. 
Captain  Constantine  was  lost  in  a  muse. 

The  same  fist  which  had  left  a  dent  in  his  hat 
now  sought  and  found  his  watch  guard.  It  was 
a  braided  cord  of  golden-brown  hair,  with  gold 
mounting.  At  this  he  tugged  very  gently.  Some 
instinct  or  habit  made  his  fingers  light  of  touch, 
as  if  they  had  encountered  those  of  a  child.  He 
pulled  out  a  broad  silver  watch,  held  it  before 
him,  and  returned  it  to  his  pocket  without  a 
glance.     All  the  while  he  brooded  on  the  tracks 

76 


THE  WINTER  BELL  77 

of  last  year's  wheels,  once  iron-hard,  now  re- 
solved into  mud  again,  where  the  shadow  of  the 
courthouse  lay  along  one  edge  of  the  road. 

From  the  door  behind,  suddenly,  there  burst  a 
man  who  hurled  himself  full  force  into  the  cap- 
tain's back. 

"Where  goin'  ?"  Old  Constantine  received  the 
shock  without  a  tremor  and  caught  the  man's 
wrist  as  he  went  spinning  by.     "Hold  on." 

It  had  been  a  notable  collision,  for  this  new- 
comer, though  fallen  one  step  downward,  stood 
as  tall  as  the  captain,  and  even  rounder. 

"Le'  me  go!"  he  panted. 

Though  he  pulled  with  all  the  advantage  of 
gravity,  of  a  good  foot  brace  against  the  top 
stair,  and  of  twoscore  years  or  more,  his  wrist 
remained  in  hard  keeping. 

"When  I  was  your  age,"  observed  the  captain 
calmly,  "I  might  'a'  been  nigh  as  pow'ful  as  what 
you  be,  young  man,  but  I  wa'n't  half  so  clumsy. 
They  tried  to  give  us  manners  too.  We  was 
taught,  those  days,  to  go  quiet  and  shut  a  door 
after  us,  and  not  for  to  tromple  down  old  men, 
women,  and  child'n.  Not  no  more'n  was  neces- 
sary need." 

This  praise  of  former  times,  delivered  with- 
out passion,  took  effect. 


78  THE  WINTER  BELL 

"Beg  your  pardon,  mister,"  exclaimed  the  cap- 
tive eagerly.  "I  was  runnin'  away.  Never  seen 
ye.     Le'  me  go.     I'm  sorry." 

He  ceased  hauling.  Captain  Constantine  re- 
garded him  with  mild  interest.  His  face,  vast 
and  brick-red  and  freckled  like  a  boy's,  pleaded 
for  escape. 

"Between  us,  you  and  me,"  said  the  captain,  "I 
guess  we'd  weigh  into  five  hund'ed.  Solid  meat, 
the  pair  of  us.  And  met  solid."  He  looked  down 
at  his  fellow  giant's  hand  and  saw  in  it  an  old  dog 
collar  studded  with  brass.  "What's  that?"  he  in- 
quired sharply.     "Rob  the  lawyers,  did  ye?" 

"He  chucked  her  to  me.  Salem.  For  another 
friend  o'  his." 

The  captain's  eyes  grew  light,  clear,  and  specu- 
lative. 

"Oh!  This  boy  in  there?"  He  pointed  back- 
ward, thumb  over  shoulder.  "You  a  friend  of 
his,  too?" 

Trapper  Kingcome,  nodding,  began  to  pull  at 
arm's  length,  but  in  vain. 

"You  bet  I  am.  Le'  go.  I  ducked  out  f'm 
under  a  suppeeny.  He  wants  me  to  git  away  with 
this.     Quick,  'fore  they  come." 

Constantine  did  not  let  go,  but  turned  and  be- 
gan leading  his  man  across  the  platform  at  the 


THE  WINTER  BELL  79 

stairhead,  thence  round  the  corner  of  the  building. 

"You  come  with  me,"  said  he  quietly.  "I 
know  the  ropes  of  this  town  better'n  what  you 
do." 

Among  wagons  and  hitched  horses  and  mud 
they  picked  their  way  through  an  inclosure  that 
ended  beneath  a  high  fence  overtopped  with  bud- 
ding blackthorn.  In  a  sunless  corner  lay  snow,  a 
fan-shaped  remnant,  coarse-grained,  blackened,  its 
edge  thinning  to  gritty  ice.  Here  the  fence  lacked 
a  board.  And  here  the  captain  released  his  hold 
of  Trapper. 

"If  you  can  git  through  there,"  he  said,  "I 
can. 

The  gap  in  the  fence  was  narrow  for  such  a 
pair,  and  the  snow  gave  bad  foothold.  Strad- 
dling painfully,  with  a  rattle  of  buttons  on  wood, 
they  bulged  through  sidewise,  the  younger  man 
first,  the  elder  next.  They  stood  in  a  pleasant 
blackthorn  lane  and  grinned  at  each  other  like 
runaway  boys. 

"What  was  it  I  called  those  twelve  discon- 
s'lates  yonder?"  The  captain  removed  his  hat, 
punched  out  the  old  dent  and  a  new  one,  stroked 
his  mop  of  grizzled  red-gold  hair,  and  became 
lost  again  in  reverie.  "Paid  high  enough  for  it 
too.     Can't  remember.     Jest  what  was  that  Ian- 


8o  THE  WINTER  BELL 

guage  o'  mine  ?  It's  kind  of  a  gift.  Come  and  go." 

Kingcome  suddenly  beamed  more  broadly  than 
ever. 

"You  called  'em  a  bo'tlo'd  of  dodunks  and 
chowderheads." 

"So  I  did!"  cried  the  captain.     "So  they  be!" 

With  a  circular,  muscle-bound  movement  he 
lifted  his  hat,  grasping  the  brim  with  both  hands 
firmly,  and  jerked  it  down  close  to  his  ears. 

"I  did  so,"  he  chuckled.  "And  by  gravy,  Fd 
pay  out  more  to  prove  it  on  'em."  He  suddenly 
forgot  his  mirth  and  gave  Trapper  a  piercing 
glance.  "Look  ahere.  Do  you  think  that  boy 
done  it?" 

Kingcome  lowered  his  eyes,  played  with  the 
dog  collar,  and  waited  before  answering. 

"I  didn'  know,"  he  began,  "but " 

The  captain  snorted,  or  blew  a  blast  of  defiance 
from  his  great  chuckle  nose. 

"Why,"  said  he,  "you're  bad  as  them!  Told 
me  you  was  a  friend  o'  his!" 

"Let  a  man  finish,  will  ye?"  broke  in  Trapper 
hotly.  "I  didn'  know  then,  but  I  stuck  by  him 
good's  I  could.  It  don't  make  no  odds  to  me 
what  a  friend's  done,"  he  added  with  infinite 
scorn.  One  sweep  of  a  freckled  fist  banished  all 
mere  deeds  from  the  earth.     "You  think  I'd  turn 


THE  WINTER  BELL  81 

my  back  on  Sale  Delaforcc  for  bein'  in  trouble? 
What's  more,  he  never  did  do  it." 

With  that  Trapper  turned  and  made  off  down 
the  lane.  His  indignation  kept  him  company;  but 
he  had  not  taken  many  steps  when  he  found  Cap- 
tain Constantine  walking  beside  him,  quite  spry 
for  an  old  man,  and  benevolent  in  aspect. 

"How  do  ye  know  he  never ?" 

Trapper  halted.  His  light  blue  eyes  hardened 
with  suspicion. 

"I  do."  He  became  sulky.  "Needn'  fret  you. 
Ain't  say  in'  how." 

The  captain  waved  that  trifle  aside  vaguely,  and 
smiled. 

"Plenty  o'  time.  They  won't  overtake  us  here," 
said  he.  "I'll  set  ye  on  your  way,  son,  if  you  tell 
me  where  you're  headin'  for.  So's  you'll  have 
no  worries  whats'ever." 

Any  old  shipmate  of  John  Constantine's  could 
have  told  that  when  he  gave  up,  changed  the  sub- 
ject, and  talked  mildly  of  things  in  general,  he  was 
a  man  who  deserved  watching  all  day,  if  not  many 
days  to  follow.  At  sea  a  Yankee  in  his  crew  had 
declared  that  the  captain,  when  he  couldn't  hold 
a  cat  by  the  head,  would  hold  her  by  the  tail  and 
get  her  skinned  if  it  took  from  here  to  Chiny. 
But  ashore  people  knew  less  of  the  captain,  and 


82  THE  WINTER  BELL 

Trapper  did  not  know  him  at  all.  So  while  these 
two  burly  gossips  wandered  down  the  lane,  filling 
it  from  side  to  side,  and  amicably  talking,  there 
was  a  drift  which  only  one  of  them  perceived. 

"Yes,  sir-ree.  Between  us,  we'd  weigh  into 
five  hundred.  Fo'ks  would  take  you  and  me  to 
be  fat.  And  right  there's  where  we  fool  'em. 
Why,  now,  you  as  ye  go  must  be  a  good  two 
hund'ed  sixty." 

" Sixty-three,"  said  Trapper  with  approval. 
"You  ain't  a  bad  judge  o'  flesh." 

The  captain  nodded  wisely. 

"I  tell  by  the  wrist,"  he  replied.  "Ketched 
aholt  of  yourn,  ye  see.  Broad  enough  for  gam- 
bolers  to  shake  dice  on,  and  pooty  nigh  as  thick. 
I  do  like  to  see  a  fellow  critter  solid.  You  can 
let  on  to  look  as  fat  as  you  like,  but  it's  all  dark 
meat,  bon'  and  gristle." 

Charles  Kingcome  fell  into  the  net  of  this  old 
flatterer,  who  used  no  more  than  truth,  yet  spread 
his  mesh  with  honeyed  art.  By  the  time  they  left 
their  blackthorn  row  and  stood  among  wharves 
by  the  river,  where  hot  noonday  sun  glared  on  the 
yellow  piles  of  lumber,  both  men  were  talking 
away  like  old  cronies. 

"If  it  wa'n't  no  more'n  to  show  the  judge," 
muttered  Captain  Constantine  darkly.     "A  man 


THE  WINTER  BELL  83 

o'  good  stout  conscience,  you  are.  I  honor  ye  for 
that,  boy.  We'll  trig  his  wheels  for  him.  And 
you  got  bowels  o'  compassion,  plenty.  If  'twas 
only  to  learn  Judge  Knowlton  there's  more  human 
nature  knockin'  round  this  world  than's  bound  up 
yit  in  his  law  calf  and  red  labels.  Yes,  sir-ree; 
you  got  enough  to  fill  a  tub,  Charley.  Good 
money  paid  out  a'ready,  and  more  where  that 
come  from.  When  you  and  me  put  our  hands  to 
it,  Charley,  we  don't  leave  go  till  somethin'  fetches 
away.  Down  opposite  this  lock-up  house  o' 
theirs,  did  you  say?" 

Ten  minutes  later  a  dreary  little  house  banked 
with  hemlock  slabs  and  shingle  shavings  echoed 
throughout  to  a  knock  that  was  heard  aboard  ships 
across  the  river.  A  young  girl  dressed  in  black 
sateen  opened  the  door  and  looked  up  timidly  at 
a  pair  of  huge  strangers  towering  on  the  step. 
Her  face,  pale  under  a  first  coat  of  tan,  and  her 
large,  dark  blue  eyes  had  in  them  the  wildness  and 
age-worn  look  of  a  changeling. 

"Mornin'  to  ye,  my  dear,"  began  the  captain 
heartily.  "Here's  a  friend  o'  yours,  Mr.  King- 
come,  brought  a  little  present  for  ye.  Because  you 
got  more  sense  than  most  of  'em." 

A  terrier  pup,  all  joints  and  paws,  but  milk- 
white,  pink-nosed  and  sleek,  bounded  past  her 


84  THE  WINTER  BELL 

from  within,  to  flop  and  jump  toward  the  strang- 
ers' knees. 

Captain  Constantine  fell  silent.  When  he  spoke 
again  it  was  to  himself  in  a  growl. 

"Hosaphat,  they  feed  the  dog  better' n  what 
they  do  her !  Here,  Charley,  speak  up.  Take  the 
wheel,  do  your  arrand.  I'm  stumped  for  words 
this  time.  Pretty,  too,  spite  of  all.  Damn  their 
lazy  hides,  whoever  — —  Don't  ye  mind  me. 
Listen  to  him,  my  dear.  A  young  one  kept  this 
way  makes  me  let  go  all  holts." 

Trapper  had  his  own  method.  He  appeared 
not  to  see  any  frightened  little  face  below  him, 
but  stooped,  and  holding  Sagamore's  collar  in  one 
hand,  with  his  other  patted  the  lanky  and  joyful 
young  wriggler  of  a  dog. 

4 'Likes  me,  don't  he,  kind  of?  What's  his 
name?"  said  Trapper.  "Sagamore?  What? 
Why,  this  collar  belonged  to  his  daddy.  Well, 
well !  'Twould  fit  him  too  soon  round  the  neck ; 
he'd  have  to  grow  like  Finney's  turnip.  I  knowed 
your  dog's  daddy  fust-rate.  Name  Sagamore,  too. 
What's  yours?" 


VII 


Early  one  morning  when  his  dream  left  him 
awake  before  sunrise  to  begin  another  day,  Salem 
stood  by  the  wall  opposite  his  bed.  He  faced  into 
the  corner.  No  man  would  do  this  willingly,  by 
nature.  Salem,  driven  into  it,  had  left  natural 
things  behind  him  long  ago. 

He  held  with  both  hands  the  flat  needle  and 
felt  its  edges.  They  were  sharp.  The  bodkin 
would  perform. 

"What's-name."  He  whispered,  though  no  one 
could  overhear.  "What's-name.  Eternity.  That's 
it.  For  ever  and  ever.  No  more  beginnin\  Quit 
all." 

Time  stood  still,  while  his  life  ran  like  a  thread 
paying  swiftly  from  a  ball  which  unrolled  to  noth- 
ing. What  else  passed  through  his  mind  is  not 
known.  If  he  wrestled  with  a  black  angel  in  that 
abyss  of  the  corner,  he  was  not  once  beaten  to  his 
knees. 

uGit  out !  Plumb  nonsense !"  he  argued,  clutch- 
ing at  reason.  "Eternity,  hey?  We're  in  the 
middle  of  her  now,  every  man  jack  of  us  we  be, 

85 


86  THE  WINTER  BELL 

and  she's  open  at  both  ends.  How  ye  goin'  to 
quit  a  thing  like  that?" 

By  the  twilight,  day  was  creeping  near  when  he 
spoke. 

"Can't  be  done.     It  won't  hang  together." 

With  an  effort  he  snapped  the  needle  in  two, 
then  turning,  dropped  the  pieces  and  walked  the 
length  of  his  bed,  back  and  forth,  barefoot,  noise- 
less, a  ghost,  but  yet  alive.  His  forehead  was 
wet. 

"Losin'  my  stren'th,"  said  Salem.  "That's  a 
mistake;  bad.  Better  keep  what's  left  ye  right 
along." 

When  he  stepped  up  to  his  machine  that  day 
and  took  hold  of  work  again,  his  neighbor  the 
house  burner  gave  him  a  squint  and  a  pursed-up 
smile,  half  mockery,  half  question.  Salem  in  re- 
turn looked  gravely  from  a  distance,  without  emo- 
tion. The  bald  head  bent  to  its  task,  the  crabbed 
fingers  moved  as  before,  feeling  among  the  corn 
and  stripping  delicately.  There  were  no  more 
looks  or  dealings. 

At  his  next  moment  alone,  somewhere  in  the 
twenty-four  hours,  a  thing  happened  which  left 
Salem  astounded.  In  his  cell  had  been  lying — 
how  long  he  did  not  remember — a  small  book. 
Salem  had  stared  into  it  once  or  twice,  but  being 


THE  WINTER  BELL  87 

no  reader  had  dropped  and  forgotten  it.  The 
thing  seemed  to  be  only  people  talking  about  their 
own  affairs,  which  did  not  concern  him.  But  now, 
at  this  very  time,  having  picked  it  up  without  a 
thought,  he  happened  on  the  words: 

Chr.  Well,  and  what  conclusion  came  the  old  man  and  you 
to  at  last? 

Faith.  Why,  at  first,  I  found  myself  somewhat  inclinable  to 
go  with  the  man,  for  I  thought  he  spake  very  fair;  but  looking 
in  his  forehead,  as  I  talked  with  him,  I  saw  there  written,  "Put 
off  the  old  man  with  his  deeds." 

Thus  far  Salem  read  standing.  Next  moment 
he  plumped  down  on  the  edge  of  his  bed,  to  read 
carefully,  once  more,  twice  more. 

"Gosh!     It's  what  I  done  myself!" 

He  sat  for  a  moment  as  though  stunned.  Here, 
alone,  he  had  met  a  brother  who  spoke  to  him. 
Someone  had  gone  through  all  this  before. 

Salem  thumbed  the  leaf,  and  began  to  devour 
the  next  page. 

.  .  .  So  I  turned  to  go  away  from  him;  but  just  as  I  turned 
myself  to  go  thence,  I  felt  him  take  hold  of  my  flesh,  and  give 
me  such  a  deadly  twitch  back,  that  I  thought  he  had  pulled  part 
of  me  after  himself.  This  made  me  cry,  "Oh,  wretched  man!" 
(Rom.  vii.  24).     So  I  went  on  my  way  up  the  hill. 

Who  was  this  talking? 

"Me?"  Salem  wondered.  "No,  I  can't  talk  so 
good." 

And  who  was  this  other  living  soul  who  came 


88  THE  WINTER  BELL 

through  a  door,  shut  and  locked,  to  ask  news  of 
him  like  a  brother?  Salem  fluttered  the  pages 
backward  till  he  saw  a  picture  of  a  man  lying  on 
a  bed  much  like  his  own;  a  man  with  a  jug  and 
a  book  upon  a  stool  before  him,  a  stone  wall  be- 
hind ;  a  big-boned  man  in  knee  breeches,  with  large 
mouth,  firm-set  nose,  his  head  on  a  rough  pillow, 
and  his  quick  bright  eyes  looking  straight  out. 
Below  the  picture  began  printed  lines.  It  was 
this  big-boned  man  who  spoke: 

As  I  walked  through  the  wilderness  of  this  world,  I  lighted 
on  a  certain  place  where  was  a  Den,  and  I  laid  me  down  in 
that  place  to  sleep:  and,  as  I  slept,  I  dreamed  a  dream. 

Salem  drew  a  long  breath,  raised  his  head  and 
looked  strangely  about  the  walls. 

"Why,  so  do  I." 

After  the  word  "Den"  someone  with  pencil 
had  drawn  a  star,  a  curved  line  from  it  into  the 
margin,  another  star  there,  and  written:  "Bed- 
ford jail." 

The  reader  sat  awe-struck.  This  was,  then, 
indeed  his  brother;  his  own  flesh  and  blood  had 
come  to  tell  him — what? 

"Lord,"  cried  Salem,  "and  me  a  poor  fist  at 
readin'  I" 

Time,  give  him  time,  he  thought,  and  he  would 
wade  through  this  mystery.    Then  remembering, 


THE  WINTER  BELL  89 

he  laughed  his  first  laugh  in  years,  a  short  but 
good  one,  which  delivered  him  from  evil. 

"Got  the  rest  o'  my  life  for  it,  if  nobody  don't 
come  take  this  book  away." 

From  now  on,  at  every  moment  which  could 
be  called  free,  Salem  read.  Often  it  was  hard 
going,  his  way  full  of  stumbling-blocks,  thorny 
words,  the  pain  of  his  own  dullness;  but  again, 
and  more  often,  he  escaped  these  and  went  for- 
ward with  delight.  All  day  at  his  machine  he 
thought  of  what  he  had  read,  and  wished  the  hours 
away  till  he  could  plunge  once  more  into  this  new 
world  and  continue  his  pilgrimage.  After  any 
hard  fall  he  went  back  always  and  looked  at  the 
picture  of  his  brother,  who  somehow  never  failed 
to  rise,  take  him  by  the  hand  and  lead  him  farther 
until  the  path  went  smooth.  Salem  no  longer 
cared  where  his  body  might  be.  The  rest  of  him 
was  out.    This  book  had  made  a  traveler  of  him. 

One  day  the  person  who  had  left  the  book  ap- 
peared. He  was  known  to  Salem  as  "a  little, 
sober-lookin'  feller,' '  quiet,  of  middle  age,  with 
hair  turning  gray,  and  not  much  authority.  He 
had  always  found  Salem  polite  though  indifferent; 
so  now  he  probably  felt  surprise  when  met  with 
a  glare. 

"You  hain't  come  to  take  it  off?" 


90  THE  WINTER  BELL 

"No,"  said  the  visitor.  "Not  to  take  any- 
thing.   But  what  did  you  mean?" 

Salem  pointed  at  his  book. 

"Smilytood  of  a  Dream,"  he  answered.  "They 
was  a  little  girl  told  me  once  about  a  rod  and 
a  staff.  I  didn't  believe  her  then.  Do  now.  They 
is  both.  You  hain't  goin'  to  carry  a  man's  staff 
away?     I'm  a  awful  slow  reader." 

The  visitor,  going  through  his  duty,  tried  to 
have  no  favorites  and  no  aversions.  He  had 
seen  this  young  man  moving  among  the  others, 
dazed  like  a  country  horse  led  through  crowds; 
he  had  watched  this  young  man's  face  change  from 
good  red  brown  to  the  pale  hardness  of  Roman 
cameo;  but  until  now,  when  Salem  grew  talkative, 
he  could  not  have  said  whether  he  wished  or 
dreaded  to  make  better  acquaintance. 

"You  like  John  Bunyan?"  he  asked. 

"That  his  name?"  cried  Salem.  "You  bet  ye! 
So  many  names  amongst  'em,  I  never  made  out 
which  was  him." 

There  followed  a  talk,  and  afterward  other 
talks  of  such  length  and  nature  as  rules  permitted. 
This  visitor,  however  much  he  may  have  believed 
the  soul  of  a  man  to  be  his  affair,  had  too  much 
sense  to  meddle.  He  brought  other  books,  of 
many  kinds,  and  let  his  beginner  choose.     Per- 


THE  WINTER  BELL  91 

haps  he  was  content  one  day  when  Salem,  looking 
up  suddenly,  in  the  midst  of  an  argument  whether 
"trout  or  pick'rel  et  better,"  exclaimed  with  great 
conviction:  uThey  is  such  a  thing  as  castin'  out 
devils !  Don't  let  nobody  tell  you  different."  The 
visitor  made  no  comment.  He  left  behind  him 
Lorna  Doone,  Sam  Lovel's  Camps,  The  Cruise 
of  the  Casco,  and  a  more  laborious  little  tome 
bought  with  his  own  pocket  money,  a  pronounc- 
ing dictionary. 

"I  dunno  how  to  say  words  right,"  Salem  had 
confessed.  "I  see  'em  here  and  sound  'em  in- 
side my  head,  but  they  git  all  balled  up  like  a 
hoss  in  damp  snow."  He  now  added,  "Thank 
ye,  sir.     I'm  a-goin'  to  learn  how  to  punnounce." 

The  visitor  went  away  pleased  but  saddened. 
Salem  bending  over  the  dictionary,  his  lips  mov- 
ing, all  his  muscles  urging  the  work,  resembled 
too  nearly  some  figure  of  a  man  reading  music 
who  would  never  play  or  sing,  never  hear  voice 
or  instrument. 

Yet  Salem  learned,  and  always  put  his  learn- 
ing as  far  as  he  could  into  practice  without  delay. 
Once  he  read  of  a  man  who  walked  round  the 
edge  of  a  table  on  his  thumbs.  Next  moment 
Salem  put  down  that  book  to  study  his  hands. 
The  place  contained  no  table  fit  for  experiment; 


92  THE  WINTER  BELL 

but  by  some  freak  in  an  old  and  badly  planned 
building,  there  ran  along  one  wall  a  narrow  ledge 
or  jog,  about  three  feet  from  the  floor.  Salem 
rose,  to  set  his  thumbs  on  this. 

He  lifted  himself,  strained  hard,  and  then 
toppled. 

"Can't  be  done." 

He  tried  and  failed  again  and  again,  till  his 
thumbs  were  livid,  wealed,  the  nails  blue,  and 
aching  as  if  burnt.  At  last  he  faced  about,  pant- 
ing, and  spoke  to  his  unseen  rival. 

"You  let  on  you  skunked  me?"  He  wore  a 
grim  smile.  "Show  ye  'fore  long.  From  now 
on  I'm  goin'  to  git  back  my  stren'th."  Then  he 
paused,  and  corrected  the  speech.  "Git — get. 
Get.  Stren'th — strength.  To  get  back  my 
strength.     And  more  too." 

Thus  began  a  peculiar  but  rigid  course  of  train- 
ing, which  never  afterward  flagged  and  which 
had  for  its  aim  nothing  less  than  the  perfection 
of  every  sinew  in  a  man's  body.  It  would  take 
time,  but  time  abounded.  Salem,  having  drawn 
up  his  own  rules  of  discipline,  became  both  slave 
and  driver.  Like  all  of  his  kind,  he  knew  many 
traditional  feats  of  strength,  old  "bon'  twisters," 
muscle  grinders,  tricks  "to  keep  ye  on  the  stretch, 
soople  as  a  cat,"  which  could  be  performed  in- 


THE  WINTER  BELL  93 

doors  as  well  as  out;  he  invented  many  others, 
odd  but  searching  trials  of  the  human  frame ;  and 
week  by  week,  month  by  month,  long  after  he 
could  go  on  his  thumbs  the  full  length  of  that 
ledge  and  return,  the  driver  kept  the  slave  at 
work. 

One  evening,  when  it  had  grown  almost  too 
dark  to  read,  Salem  found  matter  of  offense  in 
a  book.     He  had  never  done  so  before. 

"Why,  this  man's  a  liar!"  he  exclaimed. 
"Damn  whinin',  dirty  liar!" 

He  clapped  the  volume  shut,  and  with  a  flash, 
a  blind  wrench  of  anger,  tore  it  halfway  in  two 
as  a  conjurer  tears  a  pack  of  cards. 

"Sho!    No  sense  your  doin'  that,"  he  thought. 

He  put  down  the  mutilated  book,  and  sat  re- 
garding it  for  a  moment,  ashamed,  but  overcome 
by  the  ease  with  which  he  had  done  this  damage. 
Then  he  rose,  to  stand  thinking. 

"You  could  prob'ly — probably  take  any  man  in 
this  place  and  break  him  acrost — across  your  knee 
like  a  dry  stick." 

There  was  truth  in  the  figure.  But  while  he 
mused,  any  pride  or  vanity  was  lost,  whirled  away 
changing  in  a  sudden  fierce  desire. 

"Break  one  of  'em.  Chance  will  come.  Break 
the  right  one  at  the  right  time,  and  run  for  it." 


94  THE  WINTER  BELL 

Salem  had  often  felt  the  desire,  but  not  as 
now.  It  coursed  through  him  like  flame.  And  at 
that  hour  someone  without  chose  to  jingle  the 
keys,  unlock  and  open  his  door. 

A  well-known  shape  Was  entering — a  burly 
man,  square-shouldered,  in  uniform. 

Salem  took  one  step  toward  him. 

"Not  now,"  said  the  man  quickly.  "For 
God's  sake,  don't !" 

They  paused.  It  was  dusk,  but  the  man's  hard 
face  betrayed  emotion — something  like  fear,  yet 
not  fear  for  himself. 

Salem  retreated,  sat  down,  and  took  his  head 
in  his  hands. 

"I  couldn't  touch  ye,"  he  declared  bitterly. 
"Can't  even  do  that  much." 

The  other  stood  watching  him,  then  spoke. 

"That's  better.  Now  stiddy,  boy.  I  was 
afraid  you'd  spoil  your  luck  then.  Right  when 
it's  come  to  you.  Good  noos.  You  get  up  and 
come  with  me." 


VIII 

Two  days  later  a  grubby  little  man  in  a  grubby 
little  shop,  the  sign  of  which  informed  a  back 
street  that  here  second-hand  goods  of  all  kinds 
were  bought,  sold  and  exchanged,  met  one  of  the 
surprises  of  his  career.  He  was  dealing  with  a 
lone  customer,  a  pale,  dark-eyed  young  man  who 
looked  like  a  foreigner  and  who  spoke  with  care, 
haltingly,  as  if  he  had  learned  English  from  books. 
This  foreigner  proposed  to  sell  everything  he 
stood  in  from  top  to  toe — a  new  hat  which 
was  never  designed  for  his  head  or  face,  a  new 
but  ungainly  suit  of  clothes,  and  boots  to  match. 
The  dealer  foresaw  profit  with  plain  sailing. 

"Is  that  your  best  offer?  It  don't  seem  no — 
it  does  not  seem  very  lib'ral — liberal." 

The  dealer  smiled  a  sweet  Oriental  smile. 

"You  haf  misunterstood  me,"  He  murmured. 
"Dey  are  new,  yes,  but  de  suit  is  poor  mateer-yal. 
I  could  not  gif  so  moch.  It  vould  not  doo.  I  did 
not  pwonounsse  good.    Vat  I  tol'  you  vas " 

95 


96  THE  WINTER  BELL 

With  an  air  of  long-suffering  repetition  he 
abated  his  offer  by  more  than  ten  per  cent. 

Then  came  the  surprise.  This  foreigner 
dropped  his  bashful  dignity  and  became  a  native. 

"You  lie  like  Sam  Hyde,"  he  drawled  quietly. 
"Ye  pindlin'  little  Portagee,  you,  think  ye  can 
take  back  words  by  making  fritters  of  'em?  You 
talk  plain  enough  when  ye  like.  Now  jes'  turn 
to  and  rense  the  batter  out  your  mouth,  take  a 
long  breath,  and  say  hemlock'  to  onhitch  the 
jaws;  then  open  up,  holla,  and  stick  to  whatever 
comes  out.     That  is,  supposin'  we're  to  trade." 

This  advice,  given  very  mildly,  performed  won- 
ders. The  pair  drove  an  even  bargain,  with  good 
humor.  Soon  afterward  the  young  man,  trans- 
formed in  a  dark  blue  flannel  shirt,  brown  mole- 
skin trousers,  and  moccasins,  said  good  day  and 
was  answered  with  respect.  The  moleskin  pock- 
ets contained  a  little  money,  to  boot.  He  had 
entered  the  shop  as  an  awkward  stiff-jointed 
lounger  in  misfit  finery;  he  slipped  outdoors  like 
a  lean  young  hunting  dog  bound  for  the  woods. 

His  moccasins  were  machine-made ;  in  a  former 
life  he  might  have  scorned  them;  but  now,  after 
that  clumping  footgear  he  was  just  rid  of,  they 
bore  him  along  like  magic  shoes  with  wings.    In 


THE  WINTER  BELL  97 

an  hour,  at  any  rate,  he  left  the  town  five  miles 
behind  him. 

Salem  went  bareheaded.  He  got  no  hat  in  his 
trading.  Though  it  was  midsummer  there  could 
not  be  too  much  sunlight  on  his  face. 

The  second  evening  of  liberty  found  him  en- 
camped by  a  brook.  All  round  lay  quiet  farming 
country;  he  had  not  yet  seen  real  woods,  only 
groves  or  fir  lots  among  low  hills ;  but  here  by  the 
stream  hazels  and  alders  made  a  tiny  green  wilder- 
ness which,  as  he  sat  cross-legged  near  the  embers 
of  the  supper  fire,  encompassed  him  with  a  forest- 
like stillness  and  depth.  The  sun  had  set.  Above 
the  fresh  green  leaves  glowed  a  patch  or  two  of 
sky,  against  which  the  last  dayflies,  a  fine-sifted 
whirl  up  and  down,  were  madly  ending  their 
dance.  In  lanes  hidden  far  off  the  cows  had 
stopped  lowing. 

"If  I  don't  wake  up,  nowl"  said  Salem,  half 
in  earnest.    "Too  good  to  keep." 

He  desired  to  forget  these  few  days  just  past, 
along  with  many  others;  but  here  he  sat,  looking 
now  into  the  embers,  now  at  the  current  browner 
than  ailder  bark,  recalling  the  warden's  office, 
the  warden's  face  and  words.  A  pardon  from  the 
governor;  that  was  what  the  man  had  said.  Salem 
would  never  know  what  the  warden  had  thought : 


98  THE  WINTER  BELL 

how  strangely  this  youngster  heard  him  out,  look- 
ing him  straight  in  the  eyes,  uttering  not  one 
syllable,  keeping  a  face  unmoved  except  for  a  flash 
of  indignation. 

"Their  pardon?"  Salem  had  thought  then, 
and  was  thinking  still.  "Theirs?  They  ought  to 
ask  mine." 

Well,  he  was  done  with  that  world. 

"Let's  not  remember  it,"  said  Salem. 

He  sat  listening  to  the  brook,  which  lay  here 
in  a  pool,  but  wihich  somewhere  above  ran  down 
gurgling  among  roots  or  stepping-stones.  He 
drank  in  its  music  and  its  mingled  evening  per- 
fume. 

"You  can  fairly  smell  the  minnies  and  shiners 
down  under." 

A  moment  afterward,  none  the  less,  he  was 
remembering  again.  He  unbuttoned  a  pocket  in 
his  shirt  and  brought  out  a  wad  of  paper,  doubled 
flat.  This,  unfolding,  became  a  thick  envelope. 
There  was  light  enough  to  read  by. 

"For  Mr.  Salem  Delaforce.  His  Property. 
To  be  Handed  him  when  he  gets  Out." 

The  handwriting  Salem  had  already  pored  over, 
many  times.  A  bold  fist,  using  plenty  of  ink  and 
a  broad  pen,  it  was  unknown  to  him.  Salem  turned 
the  envelope  over,  to  shake  its  contents  out. 


THE  WINTER  BELL  99 

A  leaf  of  plain  paper,  bound  with  faded  red 
tape,  was  wrapped  round  all  but  the  ends  of  a 
flat  parcel.     The  ends  were  clean  bank  notes. 

"For  a  Starter,"  the  same  unknown  fist  had 
scrawled  across  the  wrapping.  "$250.  Plenty 
More  where  This  Come  From." 

Salem  could  not  guess  where;  he  had  given  up 
guessing;  and  now,  as  before,  he  studied  the 
handwriting  in  vain. 

"Well,  I  know  where  it's  going  to."  He  but- 
toned the  thing  away  almost  angrily.  "What  they 
take  me  for?  Whoever  they  be.  Plenty  of  hay- 
ing to  do  all  along  this  ro'd — road.    Slats  of  it." 

His  fire,  a  handful  of  coals  on  the  grass,  had 
died  while  he  sat  thinking.  Salem  rose  to  stretch 
his  legs.  Below  him  on  darkened  water  the  eve- 
ning foam  began  to  drift,  ghostly  bubbles  that 
before  morning  would  slide  together  in  cakes  of 
froth.  He  stared  down  at  them,  wondering. 
Silent  things  like  these  had  gone  on,  all  the  while 
he  was  away,  and  he  had  forgotten  them. 

"Bedtime,"  he  told  himself. 

But  another  forgotten  thing  caught  and  held 
him  motionless — the  silvery  beat  of  crickets  in 
warm  hayfields  thrilling  the  twilight. 

"Them,  too.     Clean  gone  out  of  mind." 

Salem  remained  there  long,  hearing  them  and 


ioo  THE  WINTER  BELL 

watching  stars  come  over  the  black  tree  tops. 
When  at  last  he  lay  on  his  well-made  bed  of 
leaves,  yet  another  sound  startled  him,  ripped  the 
veil  still  farther  off  his  memory.  It  was  nothing 
more  than  a  nighthawk  that  dropped  overhead,  a 
whirr  and  twang  like  the  tongue  of  a  Jew's  harp 
setting  teeth  on  edge;  but  that  swoop  left  him 
plunged  in  thought  which  went  down  to  the  bot- 
tom of  remembrance. 

"If  I  don't  come  awake  and  find  If  it 

don't  ring — the  bell." 

He  shivered  and  sat  up.  His  head  brushed 
the  ceiling  of  boughs.  Reaching  by  starlight  he 
caught  a  hazel  leaf,  and  pinched  it  as  one  might 
pinch  the  ear  of  a  child.  It  was  there.  He  knew 
the  soft  roughness. 

"All  right." 

Salem  lay  down  again,  heaved  a  great  breath, 
and  let  the  singing  of  the  crickets  drowse  and 
dwindle. 

He  woke  before  dawn,  swam  naked  among  the 
cakes  of  night  froth  on  the  pool,  breakfasted, 
cleaned  camp,  buried  his  fire  in  sand,  and  departed 
leaving  no  other  trace  of  human  stay.  A  won- 
derful chorus  of  birds  in  the  roadside  elms  accom- 
panied his  march,  and  before  sunrise,  when  the 
birds  fell  silent  and  began  their  visits  in  dropping 


THE  WINTER  BELL  101 

flight  from  tree  to  tree,  Salem  had  covered  a  good 
two  miles.  He  did  not  hurry,  neither  did  he  rest 
until  the  way  grew  hot.  Thus  day  after  day  his 
journey  continued;  in  camp  at  sunset  by  still 
waters,  out  again  at  bird  song  in  the  morning. 
Whenever  the  look  of  a  farmhouse  pleased  him 
he  turned  up  the  lane,  asked  for  work,  and  was 
put  to  making  hay.  The  farmers  who  hired  him, 
and  his  fellow  workers,  thought  the  new  man 
something  of  a  riddle,  but  liked  him  one  and  all. 

"That  young  furriner,"  said  one,  "don't  waste 
no  time  baingein'  back  and  forth;  he  kerries  his 
swath,  and  goes  it  like  J.  I.  C." 

uYis,"  agreed  another,  "looks  poor  as  a  snake, 
but  seen  him  turn  to,  pitching  That  boy,  I'll 
bate  ye,  c'd  outlift  Mose  Craig,  dead  weight." 

"Never  opens  his  trap,"  declared  a  third  man, 
"but  I  vow  he  ketches  a  joke  quicker  and  laughs 
heartier'n  two  folks." 

As  for  Salem,  though  unaware  of  this  praise, 
he  rejoiced  in  their  kindly  company.  His  heart 
was  enlarged.  Sometimes  he  worked  with  a  lump 
in  his  throat,  the  sense  of  restoration  moving  him 
almost  to  tears  when  he  heard  some  cheerful  coun- 
try saying  pass  among  his  mates  or  only  the  rust- 
ling ring  of  scythe  blades  that  swung  in  unison. 
But  though  more  than  once  a  farmer  offered  him 


io2  THE  WINTER  BELL 

good  wages  to  stay  the  year  round,  he  shook  his 
head. 

"After  this  job,  sir,  I  must  be  moving  on.  Got 
to — got  to  go  meet  somebody  up  yonder." 

So,  earning  his  way,  regaining  hard  health, 
Salem  tramped  northeastward  by  pleasant  summer 
roads.  His  face  turned  from  brick-red  to  a  clear 
brown,  his  eyes  had  not  so  often  the  look  of  one 
who  hearkens  for  something  behind  him. 

On  a  hot  forenoon  he  climbed  a  ridge  that 
seemed  homelike,  and  as  he  went  down  its  other 
slope,  emerged  from  young  firs  to  overlook  a 
valley  that  also  was  like  home,  though  at  first 
glance  bewildering,  wrong  end  to.  Salem  knew 
the  valley  well,  but  never  had  approached  it  from 
this  side.  Green  meadows,  their  boundary  lines 
of  old  rail  or  tumbled  stone  broken  and  smudged 
by  wild  hedge  growth,  ran  broadly  down  to  where 
at  the  shallow  bottom  of  the  landscape  a  river 
sparkled,  and  a  town,  little  houses  gray  and  white, 
straggled  under  a  clump  of  elms.  Flags,  colored 
specks,  hung  in  the  town.  Past  it  the  river,  bright 
blue,  wound  among  fields,  yet  everywhere  was 
checked,  held  in  patchwork  by  log  booms,  crowded 
with  square  turrets,  wooden  piers  aged  to  the 
color  of  granite  and  overgrown  with  choke-cherry 
bushes  planted  by  birds  long  ago.    Falls  hidden  in 


THE  WINTER  BELL  103 

the  distance  tumbled  and  hissed  with  a  sound  like 
that  of  frying. 

Salem's  inner  man  gave  a  shout  to  the  gods, 
for  this  river  came  winding,  he  knew,  from  his 
own  place.  His  outer  man  did  nothing  but  look 
in  silence,  then  remark:  "Don't  seem  to  figger 
why  they  ain't  working.  Not  Sunday.  I  can't 
hear  the  saw.  No  prettier  sound  if  'twas  going, 
the  saw." 

It  was  holiday  in  town.  Salem  entered  the 
street  and  was  carried  along,  wondering,  in  a 
crowd.  Bunting  covered  the  shops,  with  tor- 
mented paper  festoons  of  tricolor.  Arches,  gay 
though  temporary,  shone  and  trembled  overhead 
in  triumph.  A  band  of  music  was  playing. 
Women  and  girls  in  white  dresses  moved  as 
though  such  creatures  had  always  been  round, 
every  day.  Salem  stood  marveling  at  them,  until 
pushed  on. 

He  backed  into  an  eddy  and  found  time  to 
ask  a  man  who  leaned  in  a  door,  "What  they 
celebratin'?" 

The  man  removed  a  cigar  from  his  mouth  and 
looked  vaguely  over  the  crowd. 

"It's  a  sentinel,"  he  explained. 

Salem  drove  on  with  the  current,  abashed.  He 
felt  his  ignorance,  for  the  reply  meant  nothing. 


io4  THE  WINTER  BELL 

Farther  along  he  took  courage  to  ask  a  mild  old 
farmer  who  came  pressed  against  him  and  clung 
for  support  in  passing. 

"A  centinerary,  they  call  it.  Town  gov'ment's 
a  hund'ed  year  old  t'-day,  or  there'bouts.  Liter- 
ary programme  and  games  goin'  for'ard.  A  cen- 
tannual,  bub." 

Someone  else  had  not  fully  grasped  the  mean- 
ing of  this  revel,  for  a  huge  drunken  man  fell 
through  sidewise,  knocking  people  about,  and 
whooping:  "Hurrah  fer  the  Fourth  o'  July!" 
And  he  gave  the  firmament  a  hair-raising  piece  of 
advice,  what  to  do  with  Queen  Victoria. 

In  a  moment  Salem  had  him  by  the  neck,  quietly 
shaking  his  head  off. 

"Behave  yourself." 

There  were  screams.  Then  the  man  went  by, 
sobered  or  frightened,  without  another  word. 
Salem  took  his  own  course  again,  to  get  through 
this  fair  at  once,  cross  the  bridge  and  follow  the 
river  bank;  but  holding  a  purpose,  he  could  not 
stem  the  crowd  which  held  none,  and  so  had 
made  little  way  when  three  men  overtook  him. 

"You  a  Britisher?"  their  spokesman  asked. 

They  were  all  strangers. 

"No,  I  ain't,"  said  Salem.    "But  the  queen's  a 


THE  WINTER  BELL  105 

good  old  lady.  That  fellow  forgot  himself. 
Women  round." 

The  stranger  nodded. 

"You  handled  him  elegant."  They  began 
talking  all  three  together.  "Look  a-here.  We 
need  a  wrastler  for  the  next  game.  Joe  Courte- 
manche  says,  the  big,  lazy,  good-for-nothin' — 
A  purse  o'  fifteen  dollars.  You  come  along.  We 
need  a  man  to  wrastle  uptown  here." 

"I  never  did  for  money  in  my  life,"  Salem 
objected. 

"Then  you  come  do  it  for  your  country,"  they 
replied.  "For  Hail  Columby,  happy  land.  Cour- 
temanche  says  the  town's  a  hund'ed  year  old 
t'-day,  and  he'll  throw  anybody  in  it  over  the 
moon.     Says  we're  all  run  to  pigweed.  .    .    .  No, 

we  hain't  scairt  of  him,  but  He's  waitin' 

there  now,  a-grinnin'  and  chimin'  the  purse.  We 
non'  of  us  kin  handle  him,  that's  all.  Don't  want 
to  see  foreigners  walk  off  a-laughin'  at  us,  do 
ye?" 

While  Salem  regarded  them  doubtfully  their 
leader  broke  forth  again:  "W'y,  you  ain't  afraid, 
be  ye?" 

The  crowd  was  watching  them  and  listening. 

"No,"  said  Salem  again,  "I  ain't." 

"This  way,  then." 


io6  THE  WINTER  BELL 

The  three  closed  round  him,  forced  their  pas- 
sage to  an  open  door,  hurried  through  a  shop 
and  a  warehouse,  then  along  to  a  deserted  alley. 
Salem  as  he  went  expected  to  find  some  quiet  knot 
of  connoisseurs,  gathered  to  watch  a  neighborly 
bout  in  the  corner  of  a  green  field.  He  had 
wrestled  thus,  once  or  twice  before.  It  surprised 
him  when  his  companions  or  guards  turned  quickly 
into  another  back  door,  through  another  shop, 
and  forth,  battling  with  another  part  of  the  same 
crowd,  to  an  open  space,  the  very  centre  of  all. 

"Now  ye  kin  shut  yer  head!"  cried  his  leader. 
"Here's  our  man." 

Shingle  shavings  carpeted  the  road;  a  ring  of 
people  inclosed  him,  men,  women,  boys,  a  horse's 
head  among  them,  a  red  jacket  or  so  with  the 
gleaming  brass  tuba  of  the  band,  now  silent;  and 
like  water  in  rapids  a  great  babble  of  talk  poured 
round  him,  dashing  his  thoughts  to  confusion. 
Here  he  stood,  public,  alone.  He  had  stood  thus 
only  once  before,  at  his  trial.  Salem  gave  a  start 
to  turn,  checked  it,  but  felt  his  knees  quaking. 
Across  the  clean  shavings  a  man  looked  up,  eyed 
him,  and  laughed. 

"Dat  leetly  tall  boy?  Ah'll  can  see  he  was 
'fred  now,  me.  Das  too  bad,  keep  me  waitin' 
here  too  long  tarn  for  joke,  yes,  sah !" 


THE  WINTER  BELL  107 

The  speaker,  a  dark  man,  short  but  enormously 
broad,  laughed  again,  tossed  his  black  curls,  and 
continued  to  suck  a  lemon.  Already  that  day  the 
great  Courtemanche  had  been  fighting,  for  blood 
smeared  the  lemon  and  his  thick  black  mustache. 
He  had  also  been  chasing  a  greased  pig,  for  his 
canvas  jacket  shone  as  if  buttered.  He  wore 
this  garment  very  tight  over  his  huge  chest,  and 
a  padding  of  sponges  in  armpit  and  on  shoulder 
exaggerated  his  mass,  deformed  it  like  gnarls. 
His  wide  brown  face,  glossy  with  sweat,  beamed 
all  good  humor,  yet  the  good  humor,  Salem 
thought,  of  a  man  who  had  things  his  own  way. 

Voices,  close  behind,  underran  the  general 
hubbub. 

"Who's  this  other  furriner?" 

"Dunno.  They  jes'  come  and  hove  him  in  by 
the  crop." 

"He  looks  scairt  to  death." 

"Ought  to.  He's  in  for  it.  Hell  to  pay  and 
no  pitch  in  his  kittle." 

"Yes,  sir-ree,  he'd  ought  to.  Joe  Courte- 
manche'll  take  and  snap  him  in  two  like  an 
aidgin'." 

Someone  had  spoken  true.  Salem  acknowl- 
edged   that    much:    he    was    frightened.      This 


J 


tot  THE  WINTER  BELL 

crowd  would  be  like  the  other.  No  foretelling 
the  kind  of  trouble  they'd  bring  on  a  fellow. 

" What's  your  name?"  A  neat  little  man  in 
Sunday  clothes  came  bobbing  up  with  a  note- 
book. "I'm  the  judge  o'  this  contest.  What's 
your  name?" 

Salem  told  him,  and  while  he  wrote,  whispered 
anxiously  in  his  ear:  "Look.  I  ain't  got  to  say 
anything,  have  I?    To  them?" 

"What?  What?"  snapped  the  judge.  He 
seemed  to  dance  with  heat  or  excitement.  The 
book  and  pencil  trembled  in  his  hands.  "What's 
that?" 

"Have  I  got  to  do  any  talkin'?  All  I'm  scairt 
of." 

The  little  man  stared. 

"No,"  said  he.  "Why,  no,  not  unless  you  want 
to.  Nary  word."  He  screwed  his  mouth  round 
like  a  buttonhole,  and  from  one  corner  of  it 
added:  "All  you  need  do  is  break  his  pesky 
neck.  If  you're  able.  Big  tub!  Roarin'  like 
the  Gulf,  what  he  kin  do  round  here.  The  big 
bellerin'  gype." 

With  that  the  judge  skipped  away,  held  up 
one  arm,  shrilled  forth  some  very  different 
language,  impartial  and  lofty,  then  drew  aside. 
Courtemanche  flung  the  lemon  skin  playfully  after 


THE  WINTER  BELL  109 

him,  laughed,  ran  his  fingers  through  the  black 
curls,  then  moved  forward  crouching.  He  held 
both  hands  out,  low,  grinned  against  the  sun, 
and  talked  a  stream  of  gibberish  as  he  came. 
Salem  stood  waiting. 

At  last  the  bulk,  swaying  like  a  bear,  was  close 
enough.  It  left  the  ground  and  dove  with  a  joy- 
ful yell.    Shavings  flew. 

Most  of  the  onlookers  failed  to  understand 
the  next  thing  they  clearly  saw.  After  the  first 
rush  and  whirl  both  men  remained  upright  where 
they  had  met.  The  tall  youngster  was  holding 
Courtemanche  by  the  shoulders,  at  arm's  length, 
looking  down  into  his  face  quietly,  as  though 
about  to  give  him  advice.  Their  attitude  seemed 
almost  peaceful.  It  did  not  change,  till  Courte- 
manche lowered  his  head  and  began  twisting  his 
whole  breadth,  to  no  purpose  that  anyone  could 
follow. 

Jeers  of  disappointment  went  round  the  ring. 
"Wrastle!  Why  don't  ye  wrastle,  you  two?" 
But  those  who  knew  better,  said  nothing;  and 
one  by  one  other  men  began  to  guess,  when  they 
spied  rags  of  sponge  and  canvas  underfoot. 
Things  had  come  loose,  but  not  Salem's  grip. 
The  wrestlers  did  nothing  because  he  chose 
neither  to  move  nor  to  let  his  adversary  move, 


no  THE  WINTER  BELL 

except  for  the  clumsy  writhing.  Moments  passed. 
From  these  two  central  figures  a  queer  stillness 
radiated,  so  that  rank  after  rank  of  the  crowd 
became  silent;  whoever  could  see  was  watching; 
whoever  could  not,  straining  on  tiptoe  to  learn 
what  had  gone  wrong  inside  there. 

They  heard  Courtemanche  only,  puffing,  curs- 
ing, as  he  joined  his  fists  and  drove  them  upward 
again  and  again,  to  wedge  Salem's  arms  apart. 
The  wedge  failed. 

A  man  laughed ;  then  another  beside  him ;  then 
a  third  across  the  ring  from  them ;  and  some  aged 
critic  who  spoke  in  a  toothless  whistle  but  had 
good  eyesight,  demanded:  "What  is  this,  you, 
a  laying  on  of  hands?  Ye  big-headed  hornpout, 
that  boy  kin  hold  ye  there  all  day." 

Laughter  became  general.  This  public,  having 
heard  and  seen  the  vainglory  of  Courtemanche 
a  moment  ago,  took  pleasure  in  finding  him 
ridiculous. 

"Throw  him  over  the  moon,  hey?  Waitin' 
till  she's  come  full,  Joe?" 

A  small  boy,  made  bold  by  example,  shouted 
what  he  would  not  have  dared,  until  now,  to 
breathe:  "Hey,  Jozeff!  Quiddlety?  Goin' 
home  'fore  suppertime?     Pea  soup  and  onions!" 

The  helpless  champion's  face  grew  dark  red. 


en  .i_> 


m 


THE  WINTER  BELL  in 

He  loved  a  mighty  laugh,  but  not  at  himself. 
Again  he  strained;  the  deadlock  refused  to  break; 
and  then  casting  away  in  fury  what  was  left  of 
a  good  reputation,  Courtemanche  bent  his  head 
sidewise  and  bit  like  a  dog,  setting  his  teeth  in 
Salem's  forearm. 

Next  moment,  with  a  swoop,  a  lightning  shift 
of  hands,  a  bend,  clutch,  and  heave  in  one  motion, 
Salem  had  the  man  aloft.  For  what  seemed  a 
long  time,  everyone  expected  to  see  the  great  body, 
poised  in  air,  go  whirling  to  the  ground  and 
smash.  A  woman  who  spied  the  look  on  Salem's 
face  gave  a  squeak  of  terror.  Then  she  with  the 
others  became  aware  that  he  had  paused,  wav- 
ered under  the  burden,  changed  his  mind,  and  be- 
gun to  smile.  His  hands  flew  to  another  grip. 
He  lowered  Courtemanche  carefully,  head  first. 

The  wrestler's  black  curls  bored  among  the 
shavings ;  for  Salem  held  his  feet  and  walked  him 
three  times  round  like  a  windlass  before  easing 
him  down  from  the  vertical  to  the  horizontal. 
It  should  do  Courtemanche  credit  that  when  he 
sat  up,  with  chips  in  his  hair,  in  his  eyes,  and  in 
the  fresh  blood  on  his  mustache,  he  tried  weakly 
to  join  the  merriment. 

uBah  gosh,  ah  guess  he  was  the  dev' !"  said 
Courtemanche.     "No  sah,   ah'll  don't  want  no 


ii2  THE  WINTER  BELL 

more,  me.    One  tarn  he'll  be  plenty,  bah  gosh!" 

Salem,  grinning  and  embarrassed,  had  mean- 
while worked  his  way  into  the  crowd.  It  opened 
to  let  him  pass,  but  after  him  streamed  a  little 
mob  of  noisy  adherents,  thumping  his  back  and 
clamoring. 

"Quit  that,  will  ye,  boys?"  he  implored.  "Jest 
let  me  go  through  here  quiet."  No  man  wanted 
such  a  tail  to  his  kite.  This  upper  end  of  the 
street  rose  toward  the  river  bank,  where  above 
jostling  heads  loomed  the  gray  timbers  of  the 
bridge.  If  he  could  once  get  free,  across  there, 
the  town  might  go  on  well  without  him  for  an- 
other hundred  years. 

"Here.  You  wait."  The  three  strangers  who 
had  caused  all  this  annoyance,  the  little  skipping 
referee  with  his  note-book,  and  a  sweaty  man  in 
scarlet  who  carried  a  brass  trombone,  fought 
for  the  honor  of  leading  him.  "Come  take  your 
purse." 

Pushing,  dragging,  they  got  Salem  into  a  canvas 
booth  that  smelled  of  cigars  and  trampled  grass. 

"Here's  the  boy!"  they  called.  "Here's  the 
winner  for  ye!  Stood  him  on  his  head.  Fork 
out!" 

"A  neck-and-crotch  holt  it  was." 

"Twa'nt  neither!" 


THE  WINTER  BELL  113 

"Twasso!" 

"I  tell  ye  I  seen  it!" 

"Hand  over  the  purse!" 

In  turmoil  and  close  heat  Salem  found  two 
more  strangers  bothering  him.  They  wore  holi- 
day black,  stood  behind  a  counter  of  pine  boards 
and  bunting,  added  compliments  to  the  confusion, 
and  solemnly  gave  him  three  pieces  of  dirty  green 
paper. 

As  they  did  so  a  bystander  spoke  out. 

"W'y,  by  Godfrey,  I  thought  I  knowed  him 
all  along!    That's  Delaforce  the  murd'rer." 

It  was  a  big,  saturnine,  discontented  man  who 
uttered  this,  in  a  complaining  voice.  The  booth 
had  grown  still  when  Salem  turned. 

"A  haley  old  pass  things  has  come  to  nowa- 
days.   GivuV  prizes  round  to  murd'rers." 

Before  the  whine  had  ended  Salem  flung  the 
money  on  the  grass  and  walked  out.  He  stopped 
short  at  the  entrance.  Wondering  faces  watched 
him.  No  one  supposed  that  as  he  halted,  alone 
before  their  eyes,  he  was  wrestling  with  an  enemy 
greater  than  Courtemanche.  He  threw  and  won 
the  fall,  unseen. 

Turning,  Salem  went  quickly  back,  stooped, 
and  picked  up  his  money  from  the  bruised  grass. 

"Thought  he'd  need  it  after  all,"  said  that 


ii4  THE  WINTER  BELL 

whincr  who  knew  his  name.  "Guess  ye  do,  to 
rights." 

Salem  unbuttoned  the  pocket  of  his  blue  flannel 
shirt,  took  out  a  stained  wad  of  envelope,  opened 
this,  folded  his  unclean  winnings  away,  read  the 
inscription — "For  a  Starter" — and  tucked  it  all 
into  his  bosom  again. 

"Yes,"  he  said,  "I  got  a  use  for  it." 

With  that  he  stepped  across  the  booth  and 
eyed  the  discontented  one  at  close  range,  without 
passion. 

"Yes,  I  need  it,"  said  Salem.  Taking  hold  by 
the  nose,  he  wagged  the  man's  head  harmlessly 
from  side  to  side.  "But  there's  worse  needs  than 
money.  You  ain't  a  man.  What  people  like  you 
say  don't  count." 

Not  caring  to  watch  a  sallow  face  turn  pale 
or  red,  he  set  the  nose  free,  nodded  good  day  to 
his  paymasters,  ducked  beneath  a  clothesline  row 
of  flags,  and  was  gone. 

All  the  fun  of  the  fair  buzzed  after  him.  It 
sank,  the  river  cooling  and  quenching  it  with 
gurgles  under  the  bridge. 


IX 


To  SAY  that  he  disregarded  the  tongues  of  men 
had  been  easy;  but  when  time  drew  near  for 
Salem  to  follow  his  own  words  and  live  by  them, 
he  found  it  hard. 

He  was  resting,  a  figure  of  peace,  by  sunset 
water  that  burned  with  clear  yellow  flame  through 
a  meadow.  From  where  he  sat  the  bright  green 
banks  ran  level  for  a  while,  then  seemed  to  float 
suspended  between  glow  of  air  and  glow  of  water, 
then  made  a  black  bar  across  the  west.  When- 
ever Salem  dropped  in  his  fishing  line,  ripples 
broke  the  inverted  sky  below  him,  widened  their 
circle,  and  sent  gray  smoky  rings  running  down  the 
trunk  of  a  young  poplar  on  the  opposite  shore. 
Nothing  else  moved  in  all  the  landscape ;  even  the 
poplar  leaves  hung  without  a  sign  of  their  turn- 
coat waggling;  and  Salem,  whose  cast  of  the 
sinker  had  created  this  brief  stir,  remained  quite 
motionless  while  it  died  out  and  the  striped  undu- 
lation became  gray  bark  again. 

He  fished  for  his  supper.     Hornpout,  eel,  or 

115 


n6  THE  WINTER  BELL 

chub,  no  matter  which  took  the  bait,  would  be 
welcome.  A  small  iron  pan  lay  on  the  grass 
beside  him,  with  firewood  ready.  But  Salem  had 
forgotten  supper,  forgotten  his  appetite. 

"I  can't  do  it."  The  calm  which  flooded  these 
meadows,  this  unearthly  radiance,  was  illusion. 
A  black  conflict  went  on.  "I  can't  do  it.  Worse'n 
the  toothache  to  spoil  all.    I  can't  go  it." 

He  had  struggled  through  that  fair,  left  the 
town  behind,  a  good  day  and  a  half  of  marching, 
yet  now  he  sat  and  heard  the  voice  in  the  booth. 
It  whined  at  his  ear. 

"And  that  fellow  was  the  only  one  to  know 
your  name  there,"  Salem  told  himself.  "Where 
you  aim  to  go,  you  fool,  down  where  they  took 
to  work  and  tried  you,  every  man  jack'll  be  saying 
it.     Pointing  you  out." 

Behind  him,  he  knew  well  enough  without  turn- 
ing to  look  again,  an  old  guidepost  leaned  at 
a  fork  of  the  road.  Its  arms  had  dropped  askew, 
directing  travelers  toward  Mother  Earth,  right 
and  left.  Both  arms  were  gray  and  riddled  with 
bird  shot;  but  flakes  of  paint,  traces  of  lettering, 
ghostly  words  from  another  generation,  still  pro- 
claimed if  only  as  a  whisper: 

"p  Miles  to  Wing  Dam. 
48  Miles  to  Crossport." 


THE  WINTER  BELL  117 

The  worn-out  post  loomed  like  a  gallows  tree 
at  the  back  of  all  his  thoughts. 

"No,  sir.  You  can't  outface  'em.  Nine  miles. 
Right  up  to  the  edge  of  the  woods.  Your  own 
country.  The  other  way,  down —  no.  Them? 
You  had  to  lay  hands  on  three  men  inside  an 
hour,  to  town.  I'd  rather  go  live  with  the  skunks 
and  lucivees." 

A  tug  at  his  line  and  a  whirling  pull  brought 
some  moments  of  relief.  He  fetched  up  an  eel, 
and  was  busy.  But  having  got  unsnarled,  having 
cooked,  eaten,  cleared  away  supper,  and  lighted 
his  pipe,  Salem  felt  once  more  the  presence  of 
the  ghostly  alternative  behind  him. 

"You  won't  down,  you  old  sir,  will  ye?" 

He  rose,  walked  to  the  foot  of  the  guidepost, 
and  stared  at  it  through  the  twilight.  The  lop- 
sided relic  offered  him  his  choice,  right  or  left, 
north  or  south,  without  comfort. 

"All  is,  a  man  can't  stop,  hey?  Past  they 
go,"  said  Salem  aloud.  "Father  must  have  seen 
you,  many's  the  time.  Since  your  young  days  I 
guess  a  lot  of  us  has  traveled  where  you're  point- 
ing, down  below  ground.  Most  likely  grand- 
father saw  the  paint  fresh  on  you." 

Dusk  fell,  the  light  withdrew  from  air  and 
water,    the    decrepit   wooden    stump    glimmered 


n8  THE  WINTER  BELL 

above  him  and  began  to  melt  from  view,  like 
his  tobacco  smoke  that  drifted  past  it;  Salem 
waited  as  if  consulting  an  oracle;  and  presently 
the  hour,  the  symbol,  or  the  names  he  had  in- 
voked, gave  him  a  sense  of  watchful  company. 
Those  who  had  trooped  past  the  lonely  cross- 
road in  other  years,  now  were  gathering  to  see 
what  he  would  do.    Salem  had  his  answer. 

"Nine  mile  short  and  easy?"  He  reflected. 
"No,  sir.  Father  wouldn't  go  that  way;  nor 
grandfather.  The  long  and  hard,  if  it's  got  to 
be  so." 

He  gave  his  mind  no  leisure  to  change,  but 
made  at  once  toward  the  stream,  groped  together 
his  handful  of  belongings  on  the  meadow  bank, 
and  was  off,  tramping  southward.  By  starlight 
the  road,  a  short  band  of  mist,  unrolled  from 
darkness  that  was  now  cool  open  air,  now  trees 
warm  and  sweet  with  the  last  breath  of  daytime. 

Two  hours  after  midnight  Salem  halted. 

"Twenty-odd  miles  out  o'  forty-eight,"  he 
reckoned.  "Harder  to  go  back  than  'tis  for'ard, 
now." 

He  camped  on  a  dry  ledge  among  hackmatacks, 
and  fell  asleep  watching  through  their  dark  vapor 
the  bright  vapor  of  the  Milky  Way. 

The  rest  of  the  journey  he  took  at  his  own 


THE  WINTER  BELL  119 

gait,  from  noon  till  nightfall,  from  dawn  till  after 
sunrise.  A  morning  whistle  blew  as  he  came 
downhill  toward  the  town.  Early  light  covered 
a  green  sea  of  elm  tops,  green  motionless  waves, 
and  like  tidal  rocks  in  every  hollow,  gray  roofs 
here,  a  white  gable  there  with  green  shutters,  a 
broad,  low  red  chimney  sending  up  the  smoke  of 
breakfast;  above  all  two  white  church  spires,  and 
on  the  taller  of  these  a  gilt  cockerel  crowing  in 
pantomime  between  the  gilt  letters  N.  and  W.  to 
warn  shadows  that  already  streamed  away.  The 
river,  clear  gold  bordered  with  melting  brown, 
upheld  a  few  dull  shining  lines,  pink  and  orange 
masts  of  old  schooners,  against  dark  fir  woods 
on  a  hill  not  yet  climbed  by  the  sun.  Salem 
eyed  all  this  doubtfully.  The  place  of  his  trial 
he  had  pictured,  beforehand,  while  marching  on 
it,  as  hostile;  now  it  seemed  both  lovely  and  in- 
different. 

"A  fool's  arrant  you  come  on,"  he  said. 
"Errand." 

He  slipped  into  town  by  a  back  way  among 
outbuildings.  Only  half  a  dozen  persons  were 
in  sight,  and  these  went  about  their  morning  af- 
fairs with  no  more  than  a  glance  at  him.  But 
as  he  passed  a  long  gray  shed  that  hummed  with 
the  music  of  the  plane  he  saw  across  a  yard 


120  THE  WINTER  BELL 

full  of  chips  a  large  man  in  faded  blue,  who 
leaned  bulging  through  a  doorway  and  had  be- 
gun to  stare  open-mouthed. 

"HE!"  The  man  shouted,  waved  both  arms 
wildly,  and  came  running.    "You!" 

Salem  knew  at  once  the  heavy  body  that  moved 
on  such  light  feet.    It  was  Trapper  Kingcome. 

"Signs  an'  wonders!  You  ole  swamp  angel, 
you!" 

Round-faced  as  ever,  spattered  with  freckles 
to  the  roots  of  his  pale  coppery  hair,  Trapper 
blocked  the  width  of  the  road  and  caught  Salem's 
hand. 

"You  ole  Nick-o'-the- Woods,  you!  How  are 
ye?" 

Salem  laughed.  He  had  been  afraid  of  this 
meeting.  No  need:  they  shook  hands  as  if 
never  to  leave  off,  and  the  shining  of  Kingcome's 
light  blue  eyes  outdid  any  words. 

"Good  gorry,  Trapper!     You  "  Salem's 

own  eyes  blurred.  He  choked,  could  not  speak, 
and  dared  not  try  to,  overcome  by  the  hold  of 
this  freckled  hand  and  the  grin  of  this  workman 
in  dirty  clothes.  Every  best  part  of  life  seemed 
to  rise  together  from  forgotten  depths  and  stifle 

him  with  joy.    "You — why,  last  time And 

I  hove  a  bench  at  you !" 


THE  WINTER  BELL  121 

"Come  in,"  said  Trapper,  "out  the  sun."  It 
hardly  shone  over  the  mill,  underfoot  the  chips 
were  still  damp,  morning  coolness  lingered  every- 
where; but  Kingcome  spoke  and  led  Salem  along 
as  if  guarding  some  delicate  thing  that  might  wilt. 
"Mus'  go  feed  my  old  boiler." 

They  entered  a  shed  or  dark  wooden  vault  half 
underground,  sweet  smelling,  filled  in  one  corner 
almost  to  the  roof  by  a  great  yellow  mound  of 
chips,  crisp  and  curly.  These  came  blowing  down- 
ward from  a  boxed  hole  near  the  ceiling,  and 
amid  them  in  long  gusts  the  clean  high  barytone 
song  of  a  plane  running  through  clear  stuff  with- 
out a  chatter. 

"Don't  mean  to  say  you're  working?"  Salem 
regained  the  power  of  speech.  "Who  routs  you 
out  of  bed  in  time?" 

"Me?"  cried  Trapper.  "I'm  Gabriel-Blow- 
Your-Horn.  I'm  the  cherub  that  wakes  up  the 
seventy  times  seven  sleepers.  Didn'  you  hear  the 
w'istle  blart  jes'  now?  When  I  git  me  a  good 
purchase  on  the  ole  cord,  and  histe  both  boots 
off  the  ground  and  hang  there  to  finish  my  beauty 
sleep,  boys-oh,  the  fo'ks  go  shin  up  trees  f'm  here 
to  Piskehagan.    Think  she's  a  Injun  devil." 

As  they  faced  each  other,  Salem  on  a  keg,  Trap- 
per elbow-deep  in  shavings,  they  might  have  been 


122  THE  WINTER  BELL 

mistaken  for  dull  young  men  exchanging  time- 
worn  banter.  No  one  could  have  guessed,  at 
any  rate,  how  Salem  was  thrilled. 

"Ain't  this  a  hell  of  a  note?"  demanded  the 
grinning  Kingcome.     "How'd  you  git  here?" 

"On  foot" 

"You're  lookin'  fine." 

"You  haven't  changed  a  mite,  Trapper." 

They  shouted,  for  the  vibrating  music  drowned 
their  words,  as  if  they  sat  within  the  body  of  a 
giant  fiddle.  Kingcome  did  not  go  near  a  boiler 
anywhere,  but  presently  rose,  took  a  broken  hay- 
rake,  and  began  to  haul  shavings  down  the  slope 
of  the  yellow  mound.  It  was  plain  that  he  per- 
formed needless  work,  plain  that  he,  like  Salem, 
felt  the  embarrassment  of  emotion. 

"Oh,  guess  I  hain't  failed  non'." 

"How  are  all  the  boys?" 

On  this  question  Trapper  laid  hold  with  grate- 
ful energy.  He  plunged  into  his  answer,  forgot 
to  rake,  sat  down  again,  and  in  half  an  hour, 
talking  at  speed,  had  only  disentangled  the  pref- 
ace and  laid  historical  groundwork  to  his  news 
of  the  country  side.  He  was  a  master  gossip, 
Salem  not  a  bad  listener. 

"Half  a  jiffy,  don't  feed  her  out  too  quick." 
Salem  at  last  halted  the  chronicle  with  a  sigh. 


THE  WINTER  BELL  123 

He  looked  slowly  about  the  room,  hearkening 
to  the  shrill  plane,  watching  the  chips  blow  from 
the  chute  mouth,  relishing  their  fragrance,  ad- 
miring the  soft  golden  twilight  reflected  from  a 
patch  of  sun  at  the  door.  "I'll  bust.  Good  mind 
to  get  down  and  roll  like  a  horse.  You  know, 
there  where  I  was,  Trapper — I've  been  a  long 
time  starving." 

At  his  words  the  broad  freckled  face  became 
grave.  Its  roundness  could  not  lengthen,  but 
it  wore  an  infant's  look  of  distress  and  appeal. 

"I  know,"  said  Trapper.  "May  as  well  come 
to  the  p'int."  He  stopped,  then  broke  out  pas- 
sionately. "Sale,  you  must  think  I  got  a  heart 
no  bigger'n  a  beaver's  tongue !  But  how  could 
I  write  to  ye?  All  that  while  I  kep'  a-tryin', 
time  and  time  again,  but  set  there  dumb  and 
tore  up.  You  may  not  believe  it,  when  a  man's 
jaw  kin  wag  so  like  Sancho,  but  come  to  letters 
I  wan't  no  more  fit  to  write  'em  than  what  hell's 
fit  for  a  powder  house.  And  that's  a  fact. 
S'posin'  I  could,  what  use  was  letters  anyway? 
Like  goin'  up  attic  to  show  a  hoss  an  ear  o'  corn 
out  the  window!  Ontil  we  did  have  somethin' 
to  tell,  and  then  too  late;  you  was  gone." 

Kingcome  stopped  short,  mumbling  in^con- 
fusion. 


i24  THE  WINTER  BELL 

"I  never  once  thought  of  that,"  declared 
Salem.  "Never.  Nor  nothing  else  like  it."  He 
had  broken  the  ice  now.  "You  know,"  he  con- 
tinued, "they  let  me  out  on  what  they  call  a 
pardon." 

His  friend  looked  up,  still  flushed,  but  no 
longer  vehement. 

"They  told  me,"  said  Salem,  "in  their  office, 

'twas  an  Obadiah  Voe  that Was  it  our  old 

Frizzly?" 

"Yeah."  The  other  cut  in  quickly.  "Old 
Frizzly  Voe,  he  done  the  deed.  With  your  axe. 
He  went  and  give  Asy  Beard  a  tunk  that  started 
the  whol'  thing  goin'." 

Trapper  had  heaved  on  foot  and  was  raking 
once  more. 

"How'd  they  find  out?"  Salem  demanded. 
"Last  man  on  earth.  Obadiah  Voe?  The  poor 
old  string  of  misery,  what  drove  him  to  it?  They 
said  he  owned  up  when  dying.  Trapper,  look 
here.  What's  become  of  all  those  young  ones 
Frizzly  was  father  and  mother  to  ?  Good  gorry, 
he  had  'em  like  the  sands  of  the  sea." 

It  appeared  that  Trapper  would  look  any- 
where but  here.  He  went  on  combing  the  mound. 
His  pale  blue  eyes  had  grown  small  and  hidden, 
like  the  eyes  of  an  elephant. 


THE  WINTER  BELL  125 

"I  can't  jes'  tell  ye,  Sale.  I  did  hear  somep'n 
too.  Obadiah's  children  are  bein'  well  looked 
after,  they  say.    I  don't  jes'  recall  the  partic'lars." 

Unless  the  world  had  changed,  this  huge  talker 
remembered  all  he  chose  not  to  forget.  Salem 
sat  wondering.  At  last  he  gave  up  the  subject, 
and  chose  another. 

"Did  you  ever  go  see  that  little  girl?" 

"Which  one?"  said  Trapper. 

"The  one  I  chucked  you  the  dog's  collar  — — " 

"Oh,  her!  Yes,  I  give  her  the  collar  same 
day." 

Again  Salem  waited. 

"What,"  he  ventured,  "what  you  s'pose  be- 
came of  her?" 

Kingcome  fished  after  something  in  his  dirty 
blue  pockets. 

"Why,  she's  round,"  he  drawled.  "She's  livin' 
there  yit,  I  guess." 

The  talk  came  to  a  standstill  while  Salem  con- 
quered another  doubt. 

"I  don't  know,  Trapper,"  he  began  shyly. 
"Maybe  a  kind  o'  fool's  caper.  But  I  took  the 
notion  I'd  like  to  see  that  child  again  and — and 
have  a  talk  with  her." 

"Child?     Oh.     Yeah,  I  see." 

The  sleepy,  elephantine  eyes  did  not  glance  up, 


126  THE  WINTER  BELL 

but  considered  what  one  freckled  hand  was  now 
holding,  a  nub  of  blackjack  tobacco  gnawed  all 
round,  fluted  at  the  edges  like  a  pattypan. 

"I'll  tell  ye  who  you'd  ought  to  have  a  talk 
with."  Kingcome  tore  off  a  chew  and  ruminated. 
"You'd    ought    to    go    see    Cap'n    Constantine, 

that's  who.     He  could  tell  ye  "    Trapper 

suddenly  roused.  His  eyes  opened,  wide  and 
earnest.  "Look,  Sale,  you  go  talk  to  the  old 
cap'n.  He's  sick,  layin'  bedfast,  and  would  love 
to  see  ye.  You'd  take  to  him  like  a  duck's  bill 
to  the  mud.    Will  ye  go?   Will  ye  promise?" 

The  man  seemed  ready  to  implore.  Salem 
could  not  understand  his  fervor,  but  nodded. 

"All  right.     I  don't  mind." 

"Don't  ye  fergit  to."  Trapper  threw  away 
his  rake,  puffed  out  a  sigh  of  relief,  dropped  on 
the  mound  elbow-deep  once  more,  and  became 
his  old  cheerful  self.  "But  to  think  you  never 
heard  o'  that  hoss!  Why,  sir,  as  a  colt  Bales 
McCatherine  willed  him  to  Tom  Grele.  And 
now,  by  ginger! — Bales  died  in  a  hoss  blanket, 
as  he  always  'lowed  to,  and  wouldn'  have  his 
boots  took  off.  Tom  set  up  nursin'  him  nights, 
and  nothin' would  do,  his  last  night  on  earth,  but 
bring  the  colt  right  int'  the  harness  room  where 
his  eyes  could  rest  on  him.     (Mambrino  blood,' 


THE  WINTER  BELL  127 

s'e,  'keep  him  good.  If  they'd  let  me  lead  him 
int'  the  next  world  with  me,  Tom,  I'd  pay  the 
dooty.'  So  sayin'  old  Bales  reaches  up  for  the 
halter,  but  can't  make  it,  and  his  hand  drops,  so- 
fashion." 

The  interrupted  chronicle  swept  on,  full  tide. 
Salem  heard  of  great  deeds  done  by  a  horse,  now 
famous,  that  when  he  himself  went  to  prison  had 
not  been  foaled.  The  pair  of  cronies  made  up  for 
lost  years. 


It  was  late  at  night,  the  town  had  gone  to  bed, 
before  they  ceased  talking. 

"Quit  long  enough  to  sleep;  haf  to,  I  cal'late," 
Trapper  admitted. 

They  stood  in  the  road  before  his  lodging. 
Salem  took  another  last  look  at  the  darkened 
houses  and  the  broad  starlight  over  their  chimneys. 

"Funny,"  said  he,  "to  think  of  being  scared  of 
this.  They  don't  seem  just  real,  though,  yet. 
Like  coming  home,  but  coming  home  another 
person.  No.  Well,  words  can't  hit  it  off.  Good 
night  again." 

"Good  night." 

Yet  Salem  lingered  with  an  afterthought. 

"Trapper,  ain't  it  a  caution  how  a  man's  made 
to  guess  right  sometimes?" 

"You  mean  like  what?"  demanded  Kingcome. 

"Well,"  Salem  returned  slowly,  "take  it  like 
guessing  which  arm  of  a  guidepost  is  which." 

He  left  his  friend  mystified,  and  went  off  to 
make  his  bed  out  of  doors.     The  night  remained 

128 


THE  WINTER  BELL  129 

warm.  Salem  had  had  enough  of  four  walls 
when  they  were  not  needed. 

Next  morning  by  bright  sunshine  he  sought 
and  found  a  little  street  once  hateful  to  him.  It 
led  between  river  wharves  and  a  huddle  of  abject 
sheds,  the  disorderly  hinder  parts  of  buildings 
long  sunken  to  neglect.  He  remembered  every 
stone,  every  warped  gray  shingle  that  hung  scaling 
off,  or  nail  half  drawn  by  frost,  or  crazy  window- 
sash  patched  with  old  shooks  of  boxes;  for 
though  he  had  passed  them  not  often,  he  had 
seen  them  all  with  the  eye  of  acute  misery.  Now, 
as  he  went  down,  it  was  like  a  way  of  lost  foot- 
steps. Nothing  would  have  drawn  him  there 
again  but  the  purpose  which  at  the  fair  had  made 
him  stoop  after  dirty  money,  and  at  the  cross- 
road taken  him  south.  To  turn  his  head  this 
morning  and  look  toward  the  jail,  cost  him  a  pain- 
ful effort. 

There  was  no  jail.  Salem  stood  for  a  moment 
lost. 

"The  lock-up's  gone." 

Chickweed,  plantain,  and  burdocks  overgrew  a 
square  depression  in  the  ground,  where  heaps  of 
broken  plaster  crumbled  into  ruin  that  seemed 
already  ancient.  What  had  been  a  place  of 
darkness  lay  open  to  the  sun. 


130  THE  WINTER  BELL 

"Red  cow's  hair  in  the  lime,"  thought  Salem. 
uMust  have  been  about  here,  my  room." 

On  the  spot  where  he  had  first  known  agony, 
a  tall  sour-dock  upheld  its  pointed  clump  of 
seeds,  brown  as  iron  rust.  Salem  regarded  this 
weed  for  a  time.  Though  not  given  to  day  dreams 
he  brooded,  overcome  by  the  truth  of  his  mid- 
night saying  to  Trapper.  Everything  had 
changed,  flown,  melted  away,  his  own  sufferings 
along  with  the  rest,  like  the  pangs  of  a  man  dead 
and  forgotten.  Here  he  was,  another  person: 
back  from  nowhere,  a  ghost  looking  at  weeds. 

He  woke  with  a  shiver,  glanced  quickly  behind 
him,  and  stood  hearkening.    His  face  twitched. 

"No,"  said  he.     "No." 

Nothing  sounded  anywhere  but  a  rumble  and 
slap  of  lumber  loading  on  some  deck. 

"Maybe  her  house  is  gone  too." 

Salem  turned,  ready  for  more  vanishings;  but 
there  across  the  road  below  him  waited  the  small 
house  that  he  had  come  to  see.  Dreary,  un- 
painted,  askew  on  ground  sloping  toward  the 
river,  it  was  the  same,  its  foundation  still  hidden 
by  a  trough  of  hemlock  slabs  filled  with  sawdust. 

"Told  you,"  he  chuckled,  "they  never  burn  their 
banking." 

He  went  across  to  it  and  knocked  at  the  door. 


THE  WINTER  BELL  131 

If  the  little  girl  answered  his  knock  he  would 
say  and  do  just  what  he  had  planned.  His 
thoughts  had  long  been  homing  to  this  doorstep. 
He  was  Mr.  Delaforce,  and  she  the  one  who  had 
not  only  called  him  by  name  but  believed  him 
when  he  had  sat  like  the  Man  in  the  Iron  Cage 
and  believed  nothing.  Now,  while  thanking  her, 
he  would  try  to  make  her  understand,  if  a  child 
might,  what  had  lain  hidden  in  his  breast  ever 
since. 

"No  good  at  telling  things, "  thought  Salem. 
"But  out  with  it.     A  few  words." 

Then  he  would  say  good-by,  leave  her  a  pres- 
ent, and  come  away.  The  pocket  of  his  shirt 
was  unbuttoned,  the  envelope  at  hand,  with  his 
"purse"  won  from  Courtemanche  and  his  larger 
windfall. 

"Not  much  to  do,  either,"  he  complained. 
"But  it's  all  IVe  got." 

Below  the  end  of  the  house,  where  the  road 
curved  steeply  down  to  a  wharf,  men  were  load- 
ing a  vessel.  While  he  waited  Salem  took  an 
idler's  pleasure  in  the  sight  of  work.  It  was  a 
green  schooner,  the  Galilee,  that  floated  on  a 
sunshiny  blur  of  her  own  hue  and  resounded  with 
hollow  thumping  as  the  lumber  came  aboard. 

"Short  maisure,  every  stick  of  it,"  quoth  Salem. 


1 32  THE  WINTER  BELL 

"For  some  Latin  country  port,  then.  And  they 
call  her  Galilee!" 

No  one  had  come  to  the  door.  He  knocked 
again.  Soon  afterward  he  grew  conscious  that 
among  the  workers  below  one  had  stopped  and 
was  watching  in  return.  A  tall,  strongly  built 
young  man,  on  a  golden  pine  platform  which 
raised  him  halfway  up  the  foremast  of  the  vessel, 
he  stood  clear  against  the  blue,  and  forgot  a 
heavy  plank  slanting  over  his  shoulder.  He 
stared. 

For  a  moment  Salem  thought  he  knew  this 
figure  of  arrested  motion.  Then  he  was  not  so 
sure.  The  man's  red  face,  puckered  with  the 
strain  of  looking  toward  the  sun,  recalled  a  face 
that  had  peered  at  him  thus  with  difficulty  before ; 
but  when  or  where  Salem  could  not  tell.  River 
bank  and  brown  dock  water  made  an  interval  too 
wide  for  the  tracing  of  lineaments. 

"Ought  to  know  him,  though." 

One  fact  appeared  certain.  This  long  stare 
was  not  friendly. 

"Hey,  there !" 

The  watcher  on  the  lumber  pile  took  a  fresh 
grip  of  his  plank,  and  shouted. 

"Nobody  in !" 

His  voice  had  a  known  but  not  a  familiar  ring. 


THE  WINTER  BELL  133 

It  was  hard,  bold,  and  like  the  man's  face,  un- 
friendly. 

Salem  called  back  to  him : 

"Anyone  live  here  now?" 

The  other  suddenly  fell  to  work  again,  sliding 
his  long  yellow  plank  over  the  edge  of  the  pile, 
over  the  string-piece,  and  so  down  till  its  butt 
rested  on  the  deck  of  the  Galilee.  He  then  spat 
between  wharf  and  bulwark,  turned  away,  bent, 
and  lifted  another  plank. 

"I  dunno,"  he  grumbled  with  a  sour  oath.  "An* 
if  I  did,  ye  dumb " 

Salem  could  not  hear  the  rest.  He  waited, 
but  the  stranger  said  no  more,  and  took  no  further 
heed  of  his  doings,  except  to  scowl  across  now 
and  then  while  working.  For  a  third  and  last 
time  Salem  knocked  at  the  door.  He  gave  ear 
more  closely.  Inside  the  house  a  clock  was  tick- 
ing. He  heard  the  scratch  of  a  dog's  toenails 
on  the  floor,  and  soon  afterward  the  snuffle  of  a 
dog,  questioning  him  through  a  crack  at  the 
threshold.     No  one  else  came. 


XI 


He  would  try  again,  concluded  Salem,  and 
perhaps  find  her  in  the  evening,  after  supper. 
Meanwhile  time  lay  heavy  on  his  hands ;  the  pros- 
pect of  wandering  about  town  all  day  dismayed 
him;  and  when  suddenly  there  popped  into  mind 
the  promise  he  had  made  to  Trapper  yesterday,  it 
was  almost  a  welcome  thought.  He  had  no  de- 
sire to  call  on  a  stranger.  This  one  might  prove 
to  be  an  inquisitive  old  busybody,  full  of  questions, 
a  torment.  Still,  his  word  had  passed.  The  man, 
whatever  else,  was  a  friend  of  Kingcome's,  and 
old  and  sick. 

"Let  drive,  and  over  with,"  said  Salem.  uNo 
worse  than  twiddling  thumbs  all  day." 

Not  long  afterward,  therefore,  he  opened  a 
gate  in  a  tall  hedge  of  lilacs  overgrown  with 
cinnamon  roses,  and  reluctantly  faced  the  house 
which  had  been  pointed  out  to  him  as  Captain  John 
Constantine's.  A  large  white  house  with  green 
shutters,  it  stood  well  back  in  retirement  behind 
old  twisted  apple  trees  and  huge  maples.  Toward 
it  there  led  a  long  straight  path  of  pink  gravel, 
neatly  raked  and  bordered  with  outlandish  pates 

134 


THE  WINTER  BELL  135 

of  brain  coral  set  among  ribbon  grass.  In  beds, 
a  rank  on  either  hand,  peonies,  hydrangeas,  none- 
so-pretty,  bleeding  hearts,  and  flowers  of  which 
Salem  did  not  know  the  names,  grew  thriving 
as  if  well  tended.  Both  house  and  garden  seemed 
aged,  serene,  clad  with  dignity  in  a  garment  of 
tranquil  sunlight  and  green  leaves. 

Coming  from  poverty's  door  by  the  river, 
Salem  felt  somewhat  daunted. 

"Must  be  an  old  nabob,"  he  reflected,  "to  keep 
all  this  up." 

The  front  steps  were  painted  French  gray, 
spatter-worked  in  black  and  white,  all  freshly 
done,  even  to  the  curled  horns  of  the  boot  scraper. 
Two  noble  white  pilasters  flanked  the  door.  At 
the  base  of  each  lay  a  giant  three-pointed  shell  of 
the  holy-water  clam,  scrubbed  white  as  alabaster, 
and  filled  to  the  brim  with  clear  water. 

Above  one  of  these  fonts  a  card  held  the  in- 
scription : 

"KEEP  FULL  FOR  BIRDS. 

Per  Order,  J.  C." 

The  knocker  was  of  brass,  fashioned  like  an 
urn  and  a  wreath.  It  bore  no  name.  Salem,  not 
without  misgiving,  lifted  the  wreath  and  rapped. 

A  nabob   who  let  birds  drink   almost  in  his 


i36  THE  WINTER  BELL 

house,  the  young  man  reflected,  must  be  a  quiet 
little  person  of  mouselike  ways.  It  confirmed 
his  theory  when  the  door  swung  half  open,  and 
clinging  to  the  edge  as  though  blown  there  by 
some  draft,  a  tiny  dry  wisp  of  mankind,  in  loose 
dark  clothes,  with  a  beardless,  nutcracker  visage, 
blinked  sadly  upward  from  a  height  of  less  than 
five  feet. 

"Captain  Constantine,"  began  Salem. 

"No,  I  hain't,"  snapped  the  nutcracker.  "My 
name's  Orin  C.  Cook,  if  ye  want  to  know." 

This  information  came  out  so  brisk  as  to  leave 
Salem  taken  much  aback. 

"I  mean,"  he  exclaimed,  "does  Captain  Con- 
stantine live  here?" 

"Maybe  he  doos,"  replied  Mr.  Cook;  "then 
again  maybe  he  don't."  On  this  doorkeeper's 
head  a  thin  crust  of  dark  hair  seemed  glued  to 
the  scalp.  He  fingered  it  cautiously,  made  sure 
all  was  there,  and  added,  "You  that  young  for- 
eigner with  the  dollies?" 

"What?"  said  Salem. 

The  other  exploded. 

"Dollies!"  he  cried  in  a  passion.  "Doll  rags! 
Able-bodied,  and  peddlin'  doll  rags  for  to  stuff 
underneath  dinner  plates  on  table,  by  jibbers! 
What  next?" 


THE  WINTER  BELL  137 

"No,"  rejoined  Salem.  "My  name's  Dela- 
force.    They  told  me  to " 

From  a  spitfire  the  little  man  suddenly  turned 
to  the  meekest  of  lambs.  He  opened  the  door 
wide,  swinging  himself  back  with  it,  and  beckoned. 

"Come  right  in,  Mr.  Delaforce,"  he  said  with 
alacrity.  "My  mistake.  Set  your  hat  down  here. 
Oh,  you  don't  wear  none?  My  mistake  again. 
Come  right  on  upstairs.  You  be'n  waited  for,  I 
tell  ye !" 

Mr.  Cook  began  skipping  up  a  fine  old  stair- 
case with  mahogany  rail  and  spiral  banisters. 
Mounting  after  him,  Salem  felt  very  dirty  in 
this  grand  house,  where  gilt  frames  hung  shin- 
ing on  every  wall  and  polished  brass  carpet  rods 
gleamed  at  every  step. 

"By  jibbers,"  whispered  his  guide,  "lucky  you 
wasn't!  Dollies?  What  cap'n  said  about  dollies 
— cracky! — looked's  if  the  roof'd  go  flappin'  like 
both  lids  to  a  Noah's  Ark,  yes,  sir !     He  did  so !" 

In  a  cool,  dusky  upper  hall  that  smelled  of 
cedar  from  some  chest  or  linen  closet,  the  little 
man  took  breath,  cast  behind  him  a  grin  of  encour- 
agement, and  straightway  crossing  to  a  door, 
tapped  lightly. 

"Mr.  Delaforce  here,  sir." 

"Show  him  in,"  rolled  a  voice  of  thunder,  its 


i38  THE  WINTER  BELL 

volume  growing  as  the  door  opened.  "And,  Sea- 
cook,  you  run  down  to  the  galley  and  put  the 
kittle  on." 

Next  moment,  propelled  by  a  gentle  but  dis- 
concerting shove,  Salem  entered  the  room  of  the 
thunderer.  Mr.  Cook  shut  him  in  at  once.  It 
was  a  large,  high  room  with  white  woodwork, 
marvelously  clean,  full  of  sunshine  and  a  play 
of  leaves  round  the  open  windows.  A  few  pieces 
of  San  Domingo  mahogany,  brown,  glimmering, 
solemn  in  deportment,  and  two  long  deck  chairs 
of  varnished  rattan  with  fawn-colored  pillows  of 
Madagascar  cloth,  left  abundant  space  every- 
where, yet  took  the  eye  with  contrast  like  summer 
and  winter. 

"Good  mornin',  young  man.  Si'  down,"  rum- 
bled the  voice.  "Good  mornin'.  I  consider  this 
oncommon  kind,  sir.  Afraid  you'd  give  me  the 
go-by." 

Salem  faced  about.  In  the  corner  beside  him 
lay,  or  sat  abed,  the  man  who  had  spoken.  Prop- 
ped on  a  mound  of  snowy  linen,  his  round  body 
cased  in  a  flannel  jacket  no  less  white,  his  dusty 
red-gold  hair  and  beard  shining,  one  who  was 
not  a  stranger  looked  up  cheerfully,  nodded,  and 
went  on  eating  an  apple.  Salem  had  never  for- 
gotten the  broad  weather-beaten  face,  the  great 


THE  WINTER  BELL  139 

chuckle  nose,  and  brown  eyes  clear  as  a  goat's. 
This  was  the  old  unknown  who  had  winked  at  him 
in  court  and  paid  a  fine  there  for  brawling. 

"Si'  down,  boy,  si'  down." 

Salem,  in  astonishment,  obeyed. 

"Have  an  apple." 

A  litter  of  books  covered  the  bed,  a  toppling 
pile  of  books  at  the  man's  elbow  threatened  a 
reading  lamp  and  a  tall  silver  dish  heaped  with 
apples.  Among  the  bedclothes  came  a  roll  and 
a  fling,  and  an  apple  shot  into  Salem's  lap. 

For  a  time  no  more  was  said,  the  caller  not 
knowing  how  to  begin,  his  host  continuing  to  re- 
gard him  wisely  between  large  bites.  The  bed- 
posts ended  in  carvings,  ancient  brown  goblin 
heads  of  the  four  Evangelists,  who  appeared  to 
watch  Salem  and  outstare  him. 

"Don't  seem  to  have  done  you  no  great  harm," 
observed  Captain  Constantine  at  last.  "Look 
fine  as  a  glass  fiddle." 

So  saying,  and  without  change  of  posture,  he 
threw  his  apple  core  across  the  room.  It  sailed 
in  a  long  curve  exactly  through  the  middle  of 
an  open  window  and  dropped  into  the  green- 
gold  shade  of  maple  leaves.  For  a  man  in  bed, 
the  throw  was  a  feat.  Salem  admired  it.  The 
old  man  chuckled. 


140  THE  WINTER  BELL 

"Try  that  yourself.  Go  on,"  he  urged.  "Go 
on,  try  it." 

Salem  finished  his  apple,  an  early  Snow,  as 
he  guessed;  too  early,  as  the  pale  seeds  told  him, 
to  be  eaten  by  an  invalid. 

"Go  on,  chuck.  Never  mind  the  walls,  boy. 
Heave  her  sittin'." 

Salem  threw  carefully.  The  core  struck  be- 
low the  window  frame  and  bounced  back  along 
the  floor. 

"Thought  so!"  cried  the  captain  in  triumph. 
"Too  anxious  to  git  there  on  the  fust  ground  hop, 
like  all  you  young  generation.  What  they  call 
your  trajectory,  too  flat.  Now  look  ahere."  In 
three  bites  he  demolished  another  apple,  and  pois- 
ing what  was  left,  took  aim.  "Slow  and  easy. 
P'int  high  fer  the  middle  of  the  upper  sash.  A 
droppin'  fire.  P'rabola.  So-fashion."  He  re- 
peated his  trick  and  laughed.  "There's  the  whol' 
art  of  firin'  apple  cores  outdoor  from  bed.  Plenty 
o'  time  to  learn,  being  here  'in  unrecumbent  sad- 
ness* like  the  cows. 

"I've  had  enough  of  Matthew,  Mark,  Luke  and 
John's  company."  He  nodded  at  the  bedposts, 
and  chose  yet  another  apple.  "The  doctor'd  have 
a  cat  fit  if  he  knew,  s'pose.  But  these  arc  all 
good  win' falls  and  worm-ripened.  When  they 
hain't  I  take  and  meller  'em  on  Matthew's  top- 


THE  WINTER  BELL  141 

knot.  A  good  apple  never  hurt  good  man  yit. 
So  far's  that  goes,  you  couldn't  kill  me  with  an 
axe." 

At  this  word  the  captain  stopped  short,  choked, 
reddened,  and  in  anger  or  consternation  smote 
his  fist  down,  making  books  jump  on  the  counter- 
pane. 

"James  Rice,  there  I  go  both  feet!"  he  cried. 
"The  last  mortal  thing  that  ought  to  come  into 
my  all-fired  old  jackass  of  a  mouthtrap!  You'll 
have  to  excuse  me,  son,"  he  stammered  in  painful 
distress.  "I  always  go  hurtin'  folks'  feelin's  this 
way." 

Salem,  when  he  began  to  understand,  laughed. 

"All  right,  sir.  Don't  you  fret,"  said  he.  "I 
never  did  it,  ye  know.  All  that's  over  with,  and 
no  feelings  to  injure." 

Captain  Constantine  gradually  took  heart. 

"Guess  you're  right,"  he  murmured.  "Guess 
you're  right."  Subsiding,  he  lay  thoughtful,  and 
when  at  last  he  spoke  again  it  was  to  the  four 
Evangelists.  "A  good,  well-bred  boy.  Said  so, 
fust  time  ever  I  laid  eye  on  him." 

Their  odd  contest,  the  captain's  large,  careless 
method  of  discourse,  and  his  abrupt  fall  from 
boasting  to  humility,  had  won  Salem's  good  will. 
He  felt  at  home  in  the  room.  This  praise  con- 
founded him  again,  but  not  for  long;  it  was  the 


i42  THE  WINTER  BELL 

first  word  of  any  such  kind  in  years;  and  as  no 
more  followed,  its  effect  was  warming.  He 
watched  the  massive  figure  of  meditation,  the  big 
worn  face,  promontory  nose,  and  hooded  eyes, 
all  as  rudely  carved  as  the  bedpost  heads,  yet 
like  them  strong,  alive  with  droll  benignity.  The 
mop  of  hair  billowed  outward  above  the  ears, 
rejoicing  to  escape  as  it  were  from  a  ring  of 
permanent  pressure.  Another  man  could  have 
worn  this  only  for  what  it  was,  the  mark  left 
by  a  tight  hat;  but  the  captain's  head  might  have 
been  bearing  a  crown,  and  not  unworthily.  So 
at  any  rate  Salem  fancied.     He  liked  that  head. 

uNo  feelin's  to  hurt,  hey?"  rumbled  the  deep 
voice.  "Good.  Fust-rate.  The  clear  thing.  A 
haley  old  time  you  must  'a'  had  though,  son." 

Captain  Constantine  opened  his  eyes  to  fix  them 
on  Salem  with  a  look  friendly  but  doubtful. 

"Don't  you  mind  me,"  he  said.  "An  old 
codger  with  his  brain  a  little  mite  cracked,  that 
knows  it  when  she  takes  to  cuttin'  up  didos.  Ye 
see,  it's  like  this  way.  At  your  age  I'd  gone  deep 
water  many's  the  voyage.  Forty-two  years  at  sea. 
Twenty-eight  of  'em  in  command.  Married  late. 
Two  child'n. 

Fust  a  daughter,  then  a  son; 
Then  the  world  is  well  begun. 


THE  WINTER  BELL  143 

So  they  say,  and  by  Godfrey,  so  it  does  appear 
to  hold  true  at  the  time,  no  mistake.     My  little 

girl  and  my  wife,  looked H'm.    Yes.    They 

did  so.  I  can  see  'em  well,  with  the  sun  on  their 
hair  and  dresses,  like,  in  the  garden.  Not  this 
devilish  big  shebang  here.  The  small  one,  our 
garden  patch  we  rented.  The  baby,  he'd  'a'  been 
about  your  size  by  now. 

"Well,  come  to  my  last  voyage.  I  was  the 
kind  of  man — there's  a  lot  like  me — could  make 
money  for  the  owners  but  not  himself.  I  worked 
like  a  good  one  too.  We'd  always  figgered  to 
buy  us  a  little  resting-place  and  be  together,  which 
if  it's  asking  a  favor  don't  seem  greedy,  but  some- 
how we  never  got  enough  ahead.  Then  one  day, 
when  I  was  in  Chiny,  master  of  the  Moonglade, 
conic  news  my  wife  was  left  house  and  land  and 
slats  of  money.  Some  old  aunty  she'd  never  more'n 
seen  up  and  willed  it  to  her  out  of  a  clear  sky. 
Good  forch'n's  thunderbolt.  My  wife  writes  it 
all,  and  s'she  'Better  come  home,  John.'  A  happy 
letter,  'twas,  about  us  and  the  child'n.  I  had  the 
Moonglade  packed  with  cargo  tighter'n  a  Bolony 
skin,  and  we  cleared  and  put  for  home.  She  was 
a  long-laigged  ship,  more  wind  the  better;  it 
blowed  your  hair  off  most  o'  the  way,  and  we 
walked  her  along  like  sixty,  boy.   My  last  voyage, 


144  THE  WINTER  BELL 

I  kept  thinkin'.  All  went  as  smooth  as  the  cat's 
tongue  round  a  saucer.  'Twas  great  days,  my 
last  at  sea." 

In  this  narrative  the  captain  showed  his  only 
sign  of  age;  he  paused  from  time  to  time  so  long 
and  with  an  air  so  final  that  Salem  thought  he  had 
ended.  Now  he  fell  silent  and  gazed  at  the 
window,  as  if  alone. 

"I  come  ashore  here,"  he  broke  out  suddenly, 
"to  enjoy  our  blessings  with  'em,  the  gift  o'  the 
gods.  And  lo  you,  they  was  gone,  all  three  gone. 
A  month  afore,  my  wife  and  girl  died  the  same 
week  of  the  same  trouble.  And  while  they  was 
down,  the  household  on  its  beam  ends,  what  does 
my  little  son  do  but  — « —  Ye  see,  the  hired  sick- 
nurse  heard  him  talk  about  going  to  meet  his 
daddy.  She  thought  it  was  jest  talk,  but  the  poor 
infant  went  and  dumb  in  a  bo't,  to  row  out  to 
Chiny,  with  them  hands  of  his  which  their  clasp 
couldn't  more'n  meet  round  your  thumb.  She 
upsot.    They  found  the  bo't  and  oars." 

The  speaker  looked  toward  Salem  again,  and 
nodded. 

"There.  Ye  see.  Don't  know  why  you  sh'd 
get  this  outpourin'.  The's  men  would  have  let 
go  all  holts,  dropped  flat  down,  and  when  'twas 
past,  come  up  whol'  and  sound.    But  these  doin's 


THE  WINTER  BELL  145 

— call  'em  the  Lord's  or  call  'em  the  Old  Boy's 
— -I  fought  'em;  fought  'em  hard,  like  a  hard 
man,  and  my  brain  cracked  right  there.  I  know 
it  as  well  as  you,  and  humor  it  along.  So  don't 
take  no  offense  at  what  an  old  sculpin  like  me 
says  or  doos.  A  man  that  hath  great  riches,  set- 
tin'  soul  alon'  in  a  houseful  of  jooby-joos.  They 
come  yisterday  and  tried  to  sell  me  some  dollies, 
I  hear." 

Captain  Constantine  laughed,  and  reached  out 
a  muscle-bound  arm  for  another  apple. 

"Now  let's  hear  something,"  said  he,  "about 
your  own  troubles." 

It  was  a  fair  exchange;  but  Salem  sat  ponder- 
ing and  discovered  that  he  had  none.  This  tale 
out  of  the  past  drove  away  his  own  troubles,  put 
them  to  flight  and  to  shame. 

"How'd  they  treat  ye  down  there  to  prison?" 

Five  minutes  ago  Salem  would  have  thought 
the  question  impertinent.  He  tried  hard  to  an- 
swer it  now,  but  gave  a  lame  account,  chiefly  of 
the  man  who  had  come  to  let  him  out,  and  of  that 
man's  great  unexpected  kindness. 

"A  tough  old  customer  as  ever  was,  yes,  sir, 
and  scared,  for  fear  I'd  lay  hands  on  him  and  get 
kept  in  longer.  By  his  face  you'd  never  'a' 
thought " 


i46  THE  WINTER  BELL 

To  Salem's  relief,  came  a  rap  at  the  door,  and 
Mr.  Cook,  bending  backward,  overladen  to  the 
eyebrows,  drifted  in  with  a  huge  tray  of  dishes. 

"Here,  here,  Orin  Seacook,  what's  all  this?" 
bellowed  the  captain.  uThink  a  young  gentleman 
would  want  his  victuals  in  my  bedroom?  You 
take  him  downstair.  Mr.  Delaforce,  you'll  have 
to  excuse  me,  but  the  stewart'll  feed  you  right, 
or " 

"These  are  yourn,  cap'n,"  said  his  little  re- 
tainer meekly.    "Them  of  his  is  below." 

"What?  Hey?  Humph!"  The  captain's  wrath 
went  off  rumbling.  "Why  couldn't  ye  say  so?" 
He  knocked  a  layer  of  books  to  the  floor.  "All 
right.  After  you've  et,  young  man,  come  on  up 
and  have  our  talk  out." 

Thus  it  happened  that  Salem  took  his  noonday 
meal  in  a  large  and  rather  sombre  dining-room. 
He  sat  alone,  but  from  a  tall  sideboard  under  the 
lee  of  much  silver  and  britannia  ware  Mr.  Cook 
stood  watching  him.  The  food  was  more  than 
good.  He  did  it  justice  whenever  the  little  man 
slipped  away. 

"Cook!"  sounded  a  roar  from  above.  "Cook, 
bring  on  the  dessart!" 

"Cap'n,"  shouted  the  watcher  in  a  high  voice, 


THE  WINTER  BELL  147 

with  a  prompt  serious  air,  "there  hain't  no  des- 
sart!" 

"Then,  Cook,  bring  back  the  beans!" 

Not  a  line  moved  in  Mr.  Cook's  withered  face, 
but  plainly  he  was  enacting  some  old  stand-by 
jest;  for  when  he  drifted  sadly  out  he  bore  a 
delicacy  that  seemed  to  float  upstairs  before  him. 

Salem  again  did  the  meal  justice.  Over  the 
fireplace  a  black  marble  clock,  like  a  costly  tomb 
of  time,  stifled  the  minutes  trying  to  hammer  their 
way  free.  Woodbine  leaves  flickered  at  the  edges 
of  a  window,  where  against  the  sunlight  a  full- 
rigged  ship,  berthed  on  a  writing  desk,  lifted  her 
spars  and  cordage,  pennant  and  dogvane  higher 
than  a  man's  head.  Her  gilded  scroll  contained 
the  name  Cathance.  Another  ship  filled  an 
area  of  oil  painting  on  the  wall,  the  Raven's 
Head,  flying  signals  to  a  diminutive  peak  of 
Hong-Kong  behind  her.  While  Salem  viewed 
these  objects  he  encountered  the  gaze  of  Mr. 
Cook,  who  had  silently  taken  post  again. 

It  was  an  altered  gaze.  It  seemed  friendly. 
In  fact  the  little  man  stood  eying  him  now  with 
favor,  and  spoke. 

"Cap'n's  better,"  he  said.  "You  done  him  a 
heap  o'  good.  Al'ays  does,  anyone  he  takes  a 
shine  to,  and  backs." 


148  THE  WINTER  BELL 

This  news  had  a  welcome  sound. 

"I  took  one  to  him,"  declared  Salem  heartily. 
"You  bet  you!   He's  a " 

Epithet  failed  him,  but  the  other  caught  his 
meaning,  and  suddenly  broke  in,  whispering 
fiercely,  reddening  with  the  joy  of  one  who  shares 
a  pent-up  secret. 

"You  no  need  to  tell  me!  Not  a  word!"  hissed 
the  little  man.  "Many's  the  year  I  sailed  with 
John  Constantine.  By  jibbers,  I  know  him  to 
sea,  and  I  know  him  ashore!"  Mr.  Cook  drew 
near  the  table,  clung  to  it,  and  made  it  tremble  as 
in  vehement  undertone  he  sang  the  captain's 
praise.  "Only  fault  is,  he  don't  take  no  care  of 
himself  no  more,  body  nor  goods.  Haf  to  guard 
him  like  a  hen  with  one  chick,  I  do.  Money? 
Boys-oh-boys !  He'd  throw  her  to  the  birds. 
Why,  Mr.  Delaforce,  ye  know,  I'll  tell  ye 
somep'n.  I  go  round  this  house  on  dustin'  days 
and  pick  money  f'm  under  the  clock,  behind  the 
books,  off  the  carpet,  everywheres,  yes,  sir;  out 
the  salt  box  one  time.  Lucky  I'm  honest.  So  fur. 
He's  a  holy  caution.  Every  other  way,  he  wants 
house  kep'  so  neat  a  man  has  to  go  to  Halifax  to 
spit.  But  money?  Any  old  gype  in  trouble,  good 
or  bad,  he'd  take  hold  and  heave  the  whol'  ship 
overboard  for  'em!   Why,  Land  of  Izrul " 


THE  WINTER  BELL  149 

A  voice  overhead  checked  the  enthusiast,  with 
his  mouth  open  and  hand  uplifted. 

"Below  there!    More!" 

Mr.  Cook  so  far  forgot  himself  as  to  wink, 
and  hurried  out,  grinning. 

He  had  been  gone  some  time  when  Salem,  who 
sat  thinking,  raised  his  head  with  a  jerk  and 
stared  as  if  down  the  long  dusky  room  he  saw  an 
alarming  presence.  He  moved  his  chair  quietly 
back,  rose,  and  listened.  Then,  going  without  a 
sound,  he  crossed  to  the  door  of  the  hall,  dodged 
out,  and  waited  with  one  hand  on  the  newel  post. 
Like  a  thief  escaping,  he  tried  the  front  door, 
swung  it  ajar  and  slid  through. 

On  the  doorstep  he  paused  long  enough  to 
study  the  written  card  above  the  holy-water  clam 
shell: 

"KEEP  FULL  FOR  BIRDS. 

Per  Order,  J.  C.M 

From  his  shirt  pocket  Salem  took  the  wad  of 
envelope,  unfolding  it  to  read  through  smudge 
and  stain  the  words  written  there.  Again  he 
looked  down  at  the  card. 

A  moment  later  Mr.  Cook,  returning  silently 
downstairs,  found  him  seated  as  before,  alone  at 
the  head  of  the  table. 


XII 


He  climbed  upstairs,  afterward,  with  un- 
willingness and  doubt.  At  the  bedroom  door  he 
stood  still,  wondering  what  to  do,  what  to  say. 
But  when  at  last  he  went  in,  he  found  these  ques- 
tions taken  from  him  and  set  aside,  his  judgment 
called  elsewhere. 

"What  d'ye  think  of  them  for  whiskers?"  The 
captain,  sitting  up  among  his  bodyguard  of  the 
four  Evangelists,  frowned  at  his  pwn  face  on 
the  back  of  a  large  spoon.  "Redder'n  sin  and 
twice  as  ugly.  Like  a  brindle  cat's  hair  glued  on. 
If  I  had  me  some  wire-coil  ribs,  and  a  len'th  of 
spotted  calica,  you  could  stick  me  on  top  a  Christ- 
mas stockin'  for  Jack-in-the-Box.  Couldn't  ye? 
What?  Couldn't  ye?  Go  look  in  that  chist  o' 
drawers,  young  man,  fetch  me  the  shears  and 
I'll  spread  the  glittoerin'  for f ex  wide,  hey?" 

Luckily  for  the  captain's  beard  Salem  rum- 
maged the  drawers  in  vain,  and  was  soon  recalled. 

''Never  mind.  Come  si'  down.  Tell  me.  You 
said  they  larned  you  to  read,  in  there.  How's 
that?" 

150 


THE  WINTER  BELL  151 

Salem  tried  to  explain. 

"I  mean,  sir,  it  came  over  me,"  he  replied, 
"that  books  were  like  a  man  talking  to  you,  say." 

Captain  Constantine  put  away  his  convex  mir- 
ror, and  grunted. 

"Some  is.  Some  hain't,"  he  declared.  "Some's 
more  like  a  infant  teethin',  and  others  like  a 
spoilt  monkey  that  needs  him  a  dose  o'  physic. 
Good  ones,  yes;  good  ones  is  men.  And  what 
was  that,  about  larnin'  you  to  speak  right?" 

"Well,  I  studied  to,"  Salem  admitted,  "but  the 
minute  Trapper  and  me — and  I — got  to  going 
it,  we  slid  right  back  into  the  old  way." 

His  examiner  gave  a  nod  and  a  chuckle,  as  if 
well  pleased. 

"Nature,"  said  he.  "Nature.  But  come,  I 
told  you  my  worst  trouble.    What  was  yourn?" 

The  young  man's  face  turned  grave,  and  his 
answer  was  long  in  coming. 

"Bad  dreams."  He  did  not  know  that  he 
used  the  words  of  Hamlet,  but  he  did  know  that 
for  nothing  in  the  world  would  he  ever  say  more 
to  any  man.     "Have  'em  yet.     Bad  dreams." 

"Poh!  Them?"  said  the  captain  cheerfully. 
"Most  every  night  I  turn  to  and  dream  all  my 
teeth  has  fell  out.  They  say  it's  a  sign  you'll  go 
on  outlivin'   everybody  belongs   to  ye.     How's 


152  THE  WINTER  BELL 

that  for  bad?"  He  sat  thinking  a  while,  then 
added:  "Well,  guess  you're  glad  to  be  free,  all 
one  same.  Trapper  told  ye,  s'pose,  how  he  got 
ye  out?" 

"Him?"  cried  Salem,  and  started.  "Trapper? 
Why,  Trapper  couldn't  recall  nothing  about  it! 
Sent  me  to  you." 

Captain  Constantine  enjoyed  a  silent  laugh 
which  made  the  bed  quiver.  His  eyes  became 
hooded  again,  but  between  their  heavy  wrinkled 
lids  two  points  of  light  seemed  to  perform  a 
wicked,  squinting  dance. 

"Couldn't  recall  nothing,  hey?  Well,  well! 
That  young  hogset  o'  falsehood  run  dry,  has  he?" 
The  bed  continued  to  tremble.  "Why,  Trapper'd 
ought  to  be  shot  in  the  neck  with  a  pickaxe.  He 
can  remember  all  he  hears,  and  he  hears  more'n 
a  preacher  at  a  tea-canteloo." 

Mirth  gradually  made  the  speaker  slide  under 
his  counterpane,  where  he  lay  still,  with  his  beard 
rumpled  over  his  fists,  and  head  on  shoulder  like 
one  who  might  drop  asleep  weighing  some  pleas- 
antry. When  he  roused  a  moment  later  it  was 
to  hoist  his  body  upward  and  sit  against  the  pil- 
lows erect.  The  look  which  he  bent  on  Salem 
contained  nothing  of  oddity. 

"My  boy,  you  got  a  big  freckled  lummox  of 


THE  WINTER  BELL  153 

a  friend  there  who's  worth  revealin'  to  ye."  He 
spoke  with  quiet  satisfaction.  "That  young  red- 
headed rogue  el'phant,  he'd  never  let  on.  So  I 
will.  When  you  was  took  up  first,  for  a  spell 
Trapper  he  did  think  you  done  the  deed.  That 
never  changed  him  to-wards  you,  not  a  mite.  'I 
don't  care,'  s'e,  'what  a  man's  done!'  Kind  of 
extreme,  till  you  know  how  to  take  the  sayin'. 
Well,  meantime,  you  in  the  lock-up  house  breathin' 
fire,  atop  of  all  comes  to  Trapper  the  sartain 
knowledge  that  old  man  Voe,  Frizzly  Obadiah, 
had  off  with  your  axe  and  dealt  the  stroke.  On 
account  of  a  daughter  of  his — Hannah,  the  pretty 
dark  one,  all  red  and  brown  and  full  of  the  Old 
Scratch.  Or  she  was  then.  Poor  Frizzly  had  so 
many  child'n,  thicker'n  a  run  of  alewives,  no- 
body'd  thought  he  could  single  out  any  one  of 
'em  to  care  for  that  much.  A  widow  man,  too, 
so  busy  earnin'  bread  and  shoe  luther  all  round; 
but  'pears  he  did.  Your  axe  he  borrowed  for  to 
chop  some  pickerel  holes,  while  carrying  which 
on  the  ice  he  met  Asy  Beard  and  asked  him  like 
a  man  what  he  meant  to  do.  Beard  wa'n't  a 
man,  but  a  skunk,  and  answered  according  so 
to  it  they  went  in  the  snowstorm." 

Salem  nodded. 

"Two  days  before  I  found  it,  then,"  said  he. 


154  THE  WINTER  BELL 

"Wind  hauled  round  afterward,  and  swept  out 
Asy's  head  for  me." 

"Jes*  so,"  agreed  the  captain.  "And  here  was 
Trapper  in  a  clove  hitch  with  all  this  knowledge. 
One  friend's  life  in  danger,  yourn;  another,  old 
Frizzly,  would  leave  a  herd  of  orphans;  between 
ye,  poor  Trapper  he  was  tore  in  two.  What's 
more,  he'd  been  fond  of  Obadiah's  girl.  I  tell 
you,  that  boy  suffered!  Choose  he  must,  alon', 
without  help.    Who's  to  judge  him?" 

Salem  listened,  with  head  hung  down.  Shame 
overpowered  all  other  feeling  as  he  replied: 

"Not  me." 

uNor  me,"  the  captain  chimed  in  promptly. 
"Cut  short,  what  Trapper  done  was  to  leave  all 
and  follow  him.  Wherever  Frizzly  went  Trap- 
per'd  go.  Whatever  he  worked  at,  Trapper'd 
git  a  job  alongside  if  he  could,  or  else  hang 
round.  Each  man  knowed  the  other  knowed,  but 
kep'  his  head  shut,  and  they  stayed  friends.  No 
teliin'  where  they  might  ha'  fetched  up.  But  come 
last  spring,  when  the  snow  hankered  on  late  as  if 
to  stay  on  the  ground  all  summer,  four  of  'em  was 
comin'  out  the  woods,  a  sled  and  two  hosses,  Friz- 
zly settin'  aft  on  the  lo'd.  They  crossed  a  cradle 
knoll,  the  ro'd  made  a  bend  on  glary  ice,  down 
she  slewed,  whang,  like  a  beetle  on  a  waidge,  and 


THE  WINTER  BELL  155 

there  was  poor  old  Obadiah  Voe  for  ye,  mashed 
again'  a  rock  maple,  pinned  between  hardwood 
and  hardwood. 

"Dark  was  comin'  on.  They  got  him  clear,  and 
did  what  they  could,  but  saw  they  was  goin'  to 
lose  their  man.  He'd  turned  blue  as  a  whetston', 
Trapper  says.  The  pair  give  each  other  one 
look. 

"  Til  tell  ye  now,'  the  old  fellow  whispers. 
'Take  her  down  quick.' 

"So  they  did.  Couldn't  hardly  see  to  write 
under  the  trees,  nor  hear  what  was  left  of  his  poor 
stove-in  voice;  but  they  did,  and  all  signed  with 
their  hands  numb. 

"Then  lawyers  took  holt  of  the  plain  fact,  so 
you  was  lucky  to  git  out  by  summer.    Out  at  all." 

A  long  silence  fell  in  the  room.  From  down- 
stairs through  open  windows  came  the  voice  of 
Mr.  Cook,  chanting  interminable  words  to  the  air 
of  Villikins  and  His  Dinah.  Salem  was  the  first 
to  speak. 

"Who's  taking  care  of  all  those  children,  sir?" 

Yesterday  he  had  put  the  same  question.  He 
now  got  almost  the  same  answer. 

"Obadiah's?  Oh,  they're  bein'  well  looked  af- 
ter." The  captain  glanced  away,  fidgeted,  and 
pawing  roundabout,   recovered  the  spoon.     He 


156  THE  WINTER  BELL 

took  refuge  in  its  mirror,  with  a  set  frown.  "I 
can't  jes'  think,  somehow.  But  they  made  Oba- 
diah's  mind  easy,  Trapper  and  'mongst  'em  did, 
before  he  went.     His  child'n  are  doin'  all  right." 

Salem  waited.  No  more  being  vouchsafed,  he 
tried  again. 

"Don't  see  how  Trapper  could  afford,"  said 
he,  "to  give  up  all  his  own  affairs  for  mine  so 
long.     Trapper's  got  a  mother  to  support." 

This  drew  no  reply  whatever,  but  needed  none, 
for  the  captain  flung  down  his  toy  and  sat  glower- 
ing, a  bearded  image  of  distress,  guile,  and  con- 
fusion. 

"Better  ask  him.  Git  me  an  apple.  I've  talked 
my  thro't  as  dry  as  a  last  year  wossip's  nest. 
What!"  cried  Constantine  angrily,  "can't  ye 
choose  better'n  a  powder-posted  apple?  Here, 
this  one.  Take  it  and  meller  it  for  me.  Not 
there!"  he  roared.  "Not  on  Mark,  his  jib  was 
cut  too  p'inted.     Meller  it  on  Matthew." 

Salem  did  as  he  was  told,  and  bashed  the  apple 
against  Matthew's  glossy  archaic  hair.  The  cap- 
tain's wrath  subsided;  he  ate  and  grumbled  apol- 
ogy. They  sat  talking  at  random  till  Salem  got 
on  foot  to  go. 

"Where  next  after  here?"  inquired  his  host. 

"To  see  a  little  girl,"  Salem  answered.     "A 


THE  WINTER  BELL  157 

child  that  lives  down  where  the  lock-up  used 
to  be." 

"Child?    Ho.    So  she  was.    So  she  was." 

Salem  took  alarm. 

"Was?    Ain't  she  alive  now?" 

The  captain's  eyes  began  to  twinkle,  then  sud- 
denly grew  rounder  and  more  goatlike  than  ever. 

"'Course  she  is;  'course  she  is.  Alive?"  he 
echoed.  "Mary  Prior?  They  don't  build  'em 
any  livelier,  hull,  riggin'  or  ground  tackle.  Do. 
A  good  idee.    Go  see  the  child." 

As  the  door  was  closing  he  shouted,  "And  come 
see  me  again  too.  Maybe  tomorrer  I'll  git  me 
my  britches  on,  and  go  pestering  the  neighbor- 
hood some  more.     But  come  again,  boy." 

Salem  promised  and  went  out.  On  his  way 
downstairs  alone  he  paused,  and  stood  with  face 
lifted  toward  the  shadows  of  the  upper  hall, 
where  the  glimmering  hand  rail  vanished  in  a  cool 
high  dusk  that  smelled  of  cedar.  Contempt  for 
himself,  who  had  brooded  on  his  own  part  in 
the  sum  of  what  men  suffer,  likewise  faded  into  a 
region  obscure  and  tranquil.  It  was  neither  hap- 
piness nor  grief,  but  something  composed  of  both, 
fleeting  yet  perpetual,  that  poured  through  his 
mind  with  a  cleansing  wonder.  Salem  felt  it, 
could  almost  hear  it  like  music,  passing  upward 


158  THE  WINTER  BELL 

in  the  twilight.  He  stood  a  long  time,  then  went 
down,  content.  To  a  whim  of  this  old  man  above 
— no,  he  thought;  to  a  pair  of  friends,  who  would 
never  tell  him  so,  but  bandied  him  back  and  forth, 
he  owed  this  moment  of  more  than  bodily  free- 
dom. 

"I  can't  owe  nothing  smaller." 

Again  at  the  newel  post  he  halted  to  give  ear. 
Muffled  behind  some  closed  door,  and  mingling 
with  a  rattle  of  pans,  the  voice  of  the  captain's 
"stewart"   plaintively  took  up  another  verse: 

A  bold  grenadier  with  the  great  Marshall  Saxe 
Had  his  head  chopped  clean  of  by  a  Lochaber  axe, 
But  the  sergeant  replaced  it  so  neat  ere  it  fell, 
That  a  handkerchief  tied  round  his  neck  made  all 

well. 
Teary  eye,  teary  eye,  teary  idle  eye  yea. 

Before  this  miracle  was  over,  Salem  slipped  into 
the  dining  room.  His  moccasins  made  no  sound 
on  the  floor.  He  moved  quickly,  dividing  as  he 
went  a  packet  of  clean  bank  notes  into  little 
sheaves.  One  he  had  poked  under  time's  black 
mausoleum,  the  marble  clock,  another  beneath  a 
silver  trivet  on  the  sideboard,  when  footsteps 
made  him  give  back.     They  were  the  steps  of 


THE  WINTER  BELL  159 

Mr.  Orin  C.  Cook;  but  he  only  crossed  his  kitchen 
and  began,  above  a  plash  of  running  water,  to 
sing  the  great  mythical  hero  who  dared  leap 
from  a  church  spire  into  a  bag  of  shavings. 

Halfway  down,  his  boy  shouted,  "There's  glass 

in  the  sack!" 
So  he  turned  right  around  in  the  air  and  jumped 

hack. 
Teary  eye,  teary  idle 

Salem,  grinning,  darted  to  the  model  of  the 
ship  Cathance.  He  lifted  her  forward  hatch,  ran 
his  third  sheaf  into  her  hold,  and  covered  all  but 
a  green  dog's-ear  which  he  bent  down  over  the 
coaming. 

"That,"  he  thought,  in  the  sunny  garden  path, 
"leaves  nothing  but  what's  the  right  size." 


XIII 

Through  Salem's  head  that  evening  ran  the  old 
story  of  the  man  who  set  out  to  make  a  broadaxe, 
and  ended  by  making  a  sizz.  Of  him  the  fable 
might  have  been  told;  for  as  he  walked  by  sunset 
light  down  toward  the  alley  of  the  jail  and  the 
wharves  he  was  laughing  at  his  own  purposes,  their 
fallen  grandeur.  He  had  imagined  a  vain  thing: 
to  return  here  like  some  storybook  fellow,  to 
make  a  speech,  and  to  startle  a  child  with  his 
lordly  mysterious  gift;  and  now  he  was  humbled, 
nothing  remained  but  his  "purse,"  three  soiled 
green  rags  won  by  playing  the  clown  in  public. 

Salem  entered  a  shop  on  the  way  and  exchanged 
them  for  cleaner  money. 

"Enough  to  buy  her  a  dress,"  he  thought. 
"Maybe  something  over  for  a  doll." 

He  passed  on,  still  thinking  of  the  bungler  with 
the  broadaxe.  Yes,  that  fable  was  of  one  Salem 
Delaforce,  a  born  fool.  In  his  ignorance  he  had 
tried  to  make  something  beyond  his  power,  de- 
signing a  great  return  for  a  little  kindness,  when 
lo,  it  was  the  other  way  about,  the  kindness  great, 
his  return  pitiful.     The  child — he  could  see  her 

1(0 


THE  WINTER  BELL  161 

in  his  mind's  eye,  looking  down  through  the  jail 
window,  removing  a  dandelion  from  her  lips,  to 
speak  a  word  that  raised  him  out  of  blackness 
toward  her  sunlight  for  a  moment  and  kept  him 
from  sinking  back  a  wild  beast — the  child  had 
been  a  symbol.  He  had  gone  on  believing  in 
her,  in  it  whatever  it  was,  the  justice  of  the  king- 
dom of  children,  when  there  was  nothing  else  and 
even  that  seemed  idle.  Now  his  sight  was  un- 
bound, like  the  young  man  at  Dothan,  he  saw 
what  a  host  had  been  for  him  in  secret. 

"And  she  can  buy  her  a  doll."  He  laughed. 
"We'll  make  a  good  sizz." 

Sunset  poured  down  the  road,  turning  dust  to 
gold,  blinding  him  with  hot  splendor  full  in  the 
face.  Black  against  it  rose  a  pattern  of  intricate 
silhouette,  gables,  chimneys,  drooping  elms,  little 
plateaus  of  piled  lumber,  aspiring  topmasts.  He 
had  all  the  scene  to  himself,  work  for  the  day 
being  over,  the  alley  and  wharves  deserted.  It 
was  an  evening  hour  so  still  that  from  miles  away, 
in  high  pastures  overlooking  the  river,  a  muted 
clank  of  cowbells  faintly  descended.  Their  slow- 
stepping  music  accompanied  his  thought,  half 
heard  at  most.  Salem  knew  only  that  something 
made  him  uneasy,  perhaps  a  sound,  perhaps  the 
nature  of  his  errand. 


1 62  THE  WINTER  BELL 

The  green  schooner  Galilee  had  sunk  deep  at 
the  wharf  and  waited  in  her  oozy  bed  for  the  re- 
turning tide.  A  Maltese  cat,  curled  asleep  on  her 
deck  load,  was  the  only  living  creature  in  sight. 
Mud  flats  filled  the  air  with  an  evil  smell. 

Salem  raised  his  hand  and  made  a  motion  to 
knock,  while  watching  the  Galilee's  cat  below. 
His  knuckles  encountered  empty  air.  He  woke 
out  of  musing,  turned,  and  looked. 

Her  doorstep  and  the  whole  house  front  lay 
just  in  shadow,  at  the  edge  of  all  the  light  and 
heat  streaming  by.  Her  door  stood  a  little  way 
ajar,  inward,  so  that  his  hand  by  chance  had  found 
the  opening.  Blinds  were  drawn  tightly  down  in 
both  windows,  but  he  caught  a  glimpse  within 
of  what  might  be  subdued  sunlight.  Salem 
was  about  to  knock  with  better  aim,  when  some- 
thing stayed  his  hand. 

Beyond  the  door  a  play  of  shadow  and  a  scuf- 
fling movement  ceased  or  paused,  then  someone 
drew  breath  quickly  as  if  in  pain.  At  the  same 
time  he  saw  why  the  door  was  not  shut,  and  could 
not  be,  to  stay.  Above  its  knob  projected  a  bolt, 
shot  home  and  left  so,  while  on  the  floor  lay  an 
iron  socket  burst  from  the  jamb,  with  rusty  screws 
and  crumbs  of  rotten  wood. 


THE  WINTER  BELL  163 

"No!  No!"  cried  a  voice.  "Leave  this  room, 
I  tell  you !    Leave  this  house !" 

It  was  a  woman's  voice,  angry  but  not  shrill, 
rather  deepening  than  rising  with  indignation. 

"You  can't  git  away,  my  dear,"  replied  another 
voice,  a  man's,  rough,  hoarse,  cajoling,  with  a 
twang  that  Salem  could  almost  remember.  "Now 
don't  take  on  so.  I  like  ye,  that's  all.  W'oa! 
See,  you  couldn't  git  away,  didn't  I  tell  ye?" 

The  woman  spoke  again,  her  scorn  wavering 
closer  and  closer  to  tears. 

"I  know  I  can't.  You're  stronger  than  I  am. 
Oh,  it's  cowardly " 

Then  came  a  whistle,  repeated  twice — a  girl's 
whistle,  thought  Salem — after  which  a  dog  shut 
in  somewhere  began  barking  with  ineffectual  fury. 

"He  don't  scare  me  non'.     Look  here  " 

"Go,  before  I  call  for  help  and  put  you  to 
shame!    Oh!" 

Salem  quickly  and  quietly  slipped  into  the 
house.  It  was  like  passing  at  one  step  from  full 
day  to  night,  for  the  curtained  room  held  only 
the  glow  of  a  lamp  in  one  corner.  White  cloth,  a 
mound  of  needlework  on  the  table,  enhanced  this 
glow  and  cast  it  upward,  so  that  what  he  saw 
chiefly  was  a  girl's  head  and  shoulders  lighted 
from  beneath.    She  had  broken  free,  put  the  table 


1 64  THE  WINTER  BELL 

between  her  and  some  object  of  loathing.  Over 
the  lamp  her  eyes  met  Salem's  at  once,  in  a  flash, 
a  look  that  outran  words  to  welcome  him  like  one 
expected. 

Unconscious  of  this  meeting,  a  big  rawboned 
young  fellow  made  another  step  toward  her.  The 
room  resounded  with  imprisoned  barking,  above 
which  he  raised  his  voice  and  laughed  loud. 

"Git  out!  Call?  What  fur?  Little  noise 
more  or  less  don't  worry  this  neighborhood." 

Salem  advanced  behind  him,  to  speak.  His 
words  were  lost  in  the  din.  With  that  the  girl 
nodded,  turned  her  head  away,  and  called,  "Be 
still!" 

The  barking  stopped.  Both  men  remained  fac- 
ing her  as  if  she  had  commanded  them  also  to 
silence,  while  her  eyes  again  rested  their  welcom- 
ing light  on  Salem.  Wonder,  incredulity,  joy 
struggled  in  his  heart  with  dismay.  This  young 
loveliness,  tall  as  himself  or  nearly,  was  the 
child.  He  knew  it  only  by  her  eyes,  the  same 
dark  blue  regarding  him  steadily  but  with  an  in- 
ward sparkle,  and  by  the  mingling  of  bronze  light 
and  dusk  in  her  hair.  Time  had  robbed  him,  a 
few  years  had  cheated.  He  had  lost  even  his 
symbol.  But  if  she  herself  were  real  he  did  not 
care. 


THE  WINTER  BELL  165 

"This  man  troubling  you?" 

"Yes.  Always."  Her  voice  was  calmer  now, 
and  it  thrilled  in  Salem's  ear  like  music.  "He 
knows  I  live  here  alone.  I  sat  working  by  the 
lamp  so  that  the  house  would  look  as  if  nobody 
And  he  came  and " 

She  pointed  toward  the  door  with  the  broken 
fastening.  It  had  swung  open  when  Salem  came 
through.  He  nodded,  and  turned  to  the  other 
man,  who  stood  grinning  at  him. 

"Come  outside  with  me,"  said  Salem. 

This  ugly  red  face  displayed  anger,  surprise, 
but  neither  fear  nor  shame.  While  awaiting  re- 
ply Salem  knew  the  fellow;  it  was  the  same  who 
had  been  loading  planks  aboard  the  Galilee  that 
forenoon,  and  stopped  to  watch  him  like  an 
enemy  on  her  doorstep. 

"Who  in  hell  are  you?"  said  the  man.  "And 
who  ast  you  to  come  a-meddlnV  ?" 

The  harsh  voice,  and  now  at  closer  quarters, 
the  flat  nose  and  coarse  thick  mouth  seen  more 
clearly,  brought  further  knowledge  racing  back 
through  Salem's  recollection.  He  and  the  speaker 
were  old  acquaintances.  Grown  somewhat  heav- 
ier, this  was  the  green-eyed  lout  who  had  mocked 
him,  staring  in  at  the  jail  window,  and  bringing 
that  horror  of  a  woman  who  laughed. 


1 66  THE  WINTER  BELL 

Salem  only  repeated  his  invitation. 

"Come  outside." 

He  spoke  so  mildly  that  the  other  no  doubt 
thought  him  afraid.  Salem's  air  of  youthful  slen- 
derness,  moreover,  had  deceived  many  a  keener 
eye  by  day  in  the  open.  Now  by  lamplight,  at 
all  events,  a  great  admirer  of  the  ladies  and  not 
a  bad  judge  of  rough-and-ready  fighting  made  a 
mistake  which  he  was  long  to  remember. 

"You  trot  home,  boy.  We're  busy."  He 
gave  a  contemptuous  laugh;  then,  finding  his  ad- 
vice not  taken,  began  an  effort  to  stare  Salem 
down,  and  made  a  discovery.  "Why!"  he  jeered. 
"I  know  this  thing!  Delaforce  the  murd'rer. 
Then  it's  true  what  they  tolt  me."  He  swung 
round  toward  the  girl.  "Some  rich  fo'ks  took 
and  hired  a  sick  man  to  lie  him  out  o'  prison." 

She  looked  only  at  Salem,  over  the  lamp,  but 
her  quick  changing  smile  parted  something  be- 
tween the  men,  disdain  for  one,  kindness  for  the 
other. 

"I  know  Mr.  Delaforce  better  than  that,"  she 
said.  "We  were  friends  when  I  was  a  little  girl. 
You'll  do  well  to  go  with  him." 

The  green-eyed  one  could  not  flush  deeper,  but 
the  unclean  emotion  with  which  his  face  was  al- 
ready burning  altered  for  the  worse. 


THE  WINTER  BELL  167 

"Hoi  Friends,  be  ye?  The  jailbird!  I  seen 
him  lurkin'  round  this  forenoon,  sneakin'  after  ye 
like  a " 

The  simile  which  he  employed  might  not  bear 
repetition.  To  Salem — transfixed  by  a  starry 
glance,  his  heart  beating  loud,  his  head  swimming 
with  the  word  she  had  granted — it  came  like  some- 
thing monstrous,  not  to  be  borne  once.  He 
drowned  it  with  a  roar,  and  choked.  The  room 
swayed  like  a  ship,  the  walls  melted,  grew  black, 
came  closing  in  a  circle  that  glimmered  and  went 
out  as  he  caught  the  man  blindly. 

It  would  have  dropped  outdoors  like  empty 
clothing  or  a  scarecrow,  but  it  squirmed  in  the  air, 
flew  awry,  and  pitched  down  with  a  crash  that 
made  the  house  tremble. 

"You  talk  like  that,"  cried  Salem,  drawing  his 
fists  up  to  his  head,  "and  I'll  kill  ye!" 

The  man  lay  still,  crumpled  against  the  door 
jamb.  Salem  turned  from  him.  The  girl  had 
caught  her  lamp  as  it  reeled,  and  steadied  it  with- 
out knowing.    They  looked  at  each  other. 

And  then,  in  the  stillness,  not  far  away  a  bell 
began  to  ring.  It  jangled  slowly,  as  if  rung  by 
an  aimless  hand,  but  all  the  while  came  nearer. 

Salem  let  his  arms  drop,  stared  at  the  body  on 
the  floor,  and  with  head  hanging,  cast  a  furtive 


1 68  THE  WINTER  BELL 

glance  behind  him,  past  one  shoulder,  then  the 
other.  He  listened.  It  was  no  trick  of  the  brain. 
In  this  phantasmal  blending  of  lamplight  and  re- 
flected sunshine  he  stood  awake,  and  as  plainly 
as  his  own  breathing  heard  the  bell  ring. 

What  the  girl  saw  next  was  a  transformation 
that  drove  out  of  mind  even  what  she  had  seen. 
Her  deliverer — this  calm,  tall,  dark  young  column 
of  strength — began  to  totter  before  her.  His 
eyes,  questioning,  burned  out  in  despair  and  grew 
hollow;  his  face  withered  as  if  with  age;  and  his 
limbs  moved  like  those  of  an  old  man  while  he 
retreated,  groped  behind  him,  struck  the  arm  of 
a  chair  by  accident,  and  fell  into  it. 

"Is  there  snow  on  the  ground?" 

She  shook  her  head.  Though  her  eyes  had  no 
power  or  wish  to  forsake  his  blank  entreaty,  she 
was  aware  that  the  body  by  the  door  moved, 
groaned,  lifted  its  head,  and  crawling  over  the 
threshold,  got  up  dizzily  and  fled  or  staggered 
away  with  one  arm  dangling.  Afterward  she 
knew,  rather  than  saw,  that  down  the  hill  passed 
a  lumber  wagon — a  team  of  six  horses  going 
home  to  stable,  bay  horses,  the  leaders  with  a 
brass  bell  winking  between  them,  and  dirty 
blood-red  ear  tassels  nodding  from  their  bridles. 

"Don't  let  it  come  in  I" 


THE  WINTER  BELL  169 

She  ran  toward  the  door,  and  having  closed  it, 
stopped  there  in  terror.  This  broken  figure  of  a 
man  sat  watching  her  with  eyes  that  looked  out 
from  another  world. 

As  for  Salem,  he  dared  see  nothing  but  her 
face.  In  the  room,  which  had  grown  dim  after 
the  door  swung  to,  something  white  moved  toward 
him,  and  the  dead  Sagamore,  his  own  dog  whom 
he  had  buried  long  ago  in  winter,  came  and 
touched  his  knee  with  a  pink  muzzle  that  sniffed 
as  though  alive.  He  would  not  look  away  from 
her. 

"Don't  you  go!" 

She  saw  in  his  eyes  the  dread  that  all  things 
were  about  to  vanish. 

"No,"  she  said.    "I  am  with  you." 

It  took  bravery,  but  she  crossed  the  room  and 
laid  her  hand  on  his  arm.  Then,  her  terror  giv- 
ing place  to  pity,  she  knelt  by  the  chair. 

"Don't  go.  If  it  passes — the  winter  bell. 
Stay  long  as  you  can." 

His  head  fell  on  her  shoulder.  She  let  it  rest 
there,  as  if  she  had  been  his  mother.  In  a  storm 
of  weeping,  like  a  great  wind  which  tosses  and 
strains  to  uproot  a  tree,  he  heard  himself  telling 
her  all  that  no  one  was  ever  to  hear. 


XIV 

A  fortnight  later  day  was  breaking  in  the 
woods  heavily,  slowly,  coming  with  effort  through 
a  chill  smother  of  damp.  It  made  itself  felt  more 
as  darkness  withdrawn  than  as  light  increased; 
morning  seemed  to  have  lost  the  way;  and  except 
for  the  sleepy  chirping  of  a  bird  or  two  and  a 
drip  hardly  begun  among  unseen  branches,  noth- 
ing promised  that  the  world  should  ever  wake 
again.  A  smell  of  last  year's  moldering  leaves 
weighed  down  the  wet  obscurity.  Not  by  sight  but 
by  the  slope  underfoot  and  a  guess  that  a  white- 
birch  phantom  was  leaning  where  it  ought  to  lean, 
Salem  knew  his  ground.  He  was  descending  the 
northern  side  of  Rum-Time  Hill. 

Halfway  down,  a  sudden  return  of  night  over- 
spread and  told  him  that  here  stood  the  old  hem- 
lock. Salem  halted  and  dropped  on  the  grass  his 
burden,  a  canvas  bag  holding  load  enough  for  a 
horse. 

He  parted  the  bushes  on  his  right,  walked 
straight  in  through  black  undergrowth  for  half  a 

170 


THE  WINTER  BELL  171 

dozen  paces,  then  stopped  and  took  from  his 
pocket  a  candle  end,  which  he  lighted. 

"Still  here." 

At  his  feet  shone  a  dark  pool  no  wider  or 
deeper  than  a  bucket,  reflecting  the  pointed  flame 
and  his  finger  tips,  until  a  baby  frog  hopped  in 
and  went  kicking  down. 

"All  choked  with  leaves, "  thought  Salem. 
"Used  to  be  big  as  a  barrel." 

He  placed  the  candle  in  a  socket  of  moss 
and  himself  on  a  rock.  Beside  him  on  a  withered 
sapling  butt  hung  a  ragged  film  of  iron  rust.  This, 
when  Salem  put  it  there  last,  had  been  a  tin  cup. 

"Nobody  come  since,  prob'ly." 

The  pool,  a  spring  known  to  Indians  dead  and 
gone,  had  given  the  hill  its  name  when  river 
drivers  halted  there  to  mix  grog  of  Santa  Cruz 
rum  or  Medford.  Salem  found  it  a  pleasant 
thought,  for  the  moment,  that  he  could  go  in  the 
dark  to  places  which,  now  the  old-time  people 
were  no  more,  other  men  could  not  find  by  day- 
light. 

"Nobody  here  since." 

He  made  a  birch-bark  dipper  and  drank.  The 
water  was  cold,  clear,  living  as  ever.  He  sighed, 
in  part  with  satisfaction,  in  part  with  regret. 

The  spring  grew  quiet.    The  frog  reappeared 


172  THE  WINTER  BELL 

later  and  clung  to  its  margin,  like  a  tiny  scrap  of 
puckered  leather  watching  him  with  eyes.  The 
candle  burned  steady  and  wore  a  faint  halo  in  the 
mist.  By  its  light  Salem's  face  was  that  of  a  man 
who  feared  nothing  behind  him  any  more. 

"Maybe  I'll  see  her  once  or  twice  a  year,  when 
I  go  down." 

For  two  weeks  he  had  worked  hard,  earning 
money  toward  the  supplies,  the  horseload  in  the 
bag.  He  had  lacked  time,  ran  his  excuse — lacked 
courage,  he  knew  in  his  heart — to  return  to  her 
door  until  the  day  before  yesterday,  when  no  one 
answered  his  knock.  He  had  not  seen  her  after 
that  night. 

"Bawled  like  a  baby,"  he  thought. 

But  no,  he  was  not  ashamed.  Doubt,  ignorance 
or  doubt,  had  kept  him  away.  What  could  a  man 
tell  her,  what  could  he  have  stammered  to  one 
who  twice  in  his  life  had  preserved  his  soul,  rea- 
son, what  you  call  it,  from  destruction? 

"Round  Christmas  time,  say,  I'll  try  again." 

He  smiled,  knowing  well  that  he  could  not  go 
without  her  so  long. 

"A  lon'ly  way  of  coming  home,  this  is." 

He  had  missed  his  other  friends.  A  call  at 
the  captain's  had  brought  forth  only  Mr.  Cook, 
short-spoken,  fidgety,  and  secretive :  Captain  Con- 


THE  WINTER  BELL  173 

stantine  was  "got  up  and  traipsed  off  a-fishin'  some- 
wheres,  when  he  ought  to  known  better.,,  King- 
come,  too,  was  gone  from  mill  and  boarding- 
house  without  word  left.  Salem's  good-byes  had 
failed  on  every  hand.  He  sat  here  very  much 
alone  in  the  night  mist,  by  a  forgotten  well 
among  rocks  and  trees. 

"No  good,"  he  said  aloud. 

There  was  no  pleasure,  after  all,  in  the  things 
he  knew  best,  in  a  gift  like  this  of  homing  straight 
to  places  the  most  beloved.  A  choked  spring:  he 
would  come  with  a  spade  one  day  and  clear  it: 
but  a  choked  spring  and  a  wafer  of  iron  rust 
eaten  through  with  holes,  warned  him  what  to  ex- 
pect. His  cabin  by  the  lake  would  be  a  dreary 
sight.  He  smelled  the  mustiness  from  here,  felt 
in  advance  the  peculiar  melancholy  that  hovers 
in  a  dwelling  retaken  by  weeds  and  forest  growth. 

He  rose.  His  fellow  thinker,  the  infant  frog, 
at  once  deserted  him  and  went  down  quite  cheer- 
ful, swimming  with  hind  legs  only.  Salem  blew 
the  candle  out  and  waded  through  leaves  to  his 
bag.  It  seemed  heavier  than  before,  the  mist 
darker.  At  the  foot  of  the  hill  he  went  stum- 
bling, now  in  moss-grown  corduroy  road,  now  in 
stale  water  or  cold,  drenching  grass  that  lined 
the  hollows  of  thank-you-marms. 


174  THE  WINTER  BELL 

He  made  good  speed,  however,  for  Lambkill 
Heath,  seen  from  another  hilltop,  stretched  gray 
without  form  under  a  border  of  black  woods,  these 
in  turn  under  starlight  filling  a  sky  the  darkness 
of  which  had  as  yet  no  more  than  a  greenish  tinge. 
The  lower  stars  quivered  and  shook,  all  but  the 
morning  star,  hung  aloft  like  a  tiny  though  in- 
tenser  moon. 

"Getting  nigh  home." 

Salem  crossed  the  heath  in  a  brightening  vapor. 
When  fir  woods  again  solemnly  inclosed  him  he 
could  see  the  grass  of  the  winter  sled  road  which 
he  followed. 

"Here  'tis." 

He  had  reached  the  lake  near  his  own  cove  be- 
fore sunrise.  Dropping  the  bag,  he  sat  down. 
Blackened  granite  rocks,  their  bases  faintly  striped 
with  paler  bleaching,  huddled  among  reeds  at  a 
margin  of  brown  water.  Beyond  lay  nothing  but 
mist,  as  far  as  the  hills  now  edged  with  radiance 
where  the  great  star  dissolved.  It  was  a  cold 
scene  to  look  upon,  the  air  biting. 

"A  poor  time  to  visit  your  house  in  ruin.  For 
old  time's  sake,  better  start  the  day  with  a  swim. 
Rouse  your  blood,  too." 

Salem  stripped,  and  climbed  down  to  a  flat 
rock  from  which  he  had  often  plunged.     That 


THE  WINTER  BELL  175 

icy-looking  smoke  made  a  man  blench,  but  he 
gathered  himself,  set  his  teeth,  and  dove. 

He  came  up  laughing,  for  the  water  was  warm 
as  new  milk. 

"I'd  forgotten." 

The  smell  of  it,  too,  overcame  him  with  remem- 
brance, a  frail  sweetness  blended  of  many  hints 
— like  green  leaves  crushed,  or  live  trout,  or  wil- 
low bark  just  peeled — yet  unlike  them  and  with- 
out name,  an  exhalation  from  all  forest  roots  and 
inland  waters.  He  swam  lazily,  then  floated  on 
his  back,  watching  the  smoke  curl  upward,  melt, 
and  drift  with  patches  of  blue  sky.  A  loon  far 
away  began  to  laugh. 

From  near  by  came  a  rippling  sound  as  of  some 
animal  that  swam  quietly;  a  deer,  perhaps,  cross- 
ing the  lake  before  sunrise.  Treading  water, 
Salem  looked  about;  but  he  could  see  nothing,  and 
lay  back  to  float.  The  smell  of  water  lilies,  fresh 
and  clean  as  rain,  drew  by  on  the  surface. 

Afterward,  rolling  over  with  a  splash,  Salem 
buried  his  face,  then  raised  it,  to  swim  out.  For 
a  moment,  while  his  eyes  were  dripping,  he 
thought  he  saw  in  the  mist  a  shadow  likeness  of 
Mary  Prior's  face  pass  in  profile  toward  shore. 
It  faded  slowly  as  a  cloud  picture.  Although 
Salem's  eyes  did  not  often  play  false,  the  illusion 


17*  THE  WINTER  BELL 

failed  to  startle  him,  for  she  had  been  in  his  head 
all  the  while.  He  buried  his  face  again,  went  rac- 
ing toward  the  farther  shore,  across  deep  water, 
turned  at  the  edge  of  lily  pads,  and  came  racing 
back. 

The  sun  warmed  the  grass  and  dried  him, 
when  at  last  he  sat  on  shore  by  his  bag.  Dress- 
ing, he  thought  there  came  voices  behind  him,  but 
listened  and  heard  no  more.  A  crow  cawed  some- 
where among  bright  fluttering  tops  of  poplar. 

"Cook  breakfast  here  and  make  tea?"  Salem 
debated  the  question.  "Or  go  up  now  and  see 
the  worst?" 

It  was  better,  he  concluded,  to  have  this  for- 
lorn part  over  with,  and  do  his  home  coming 
while  still  in  a  glow.  Salem  jumped  up  and 
mounted  the  bank. 

His  house  looked  out  at  him  from  the  deepest 
bend  of  the  fir  wall.  It  was  not  a  ruin  or  over- 
grown, but  stood  there  low  and  brown  as  ever, 
the  door  open,  the  chimney  smoking.  A  yellow 
tent  rose  behind  it. 

"Someone's  moved  in.  Some  rascal's  taken  her 
over." 

Salem  drew  near  slowly.  This  might  prove 
worse  than  what  he  had  imagined.  A  hungry 
scent  of  bacon  and  coffee  came  out  to  greet  him. 


THE  WINTER  BELL  177 

And  then,  white,  glossy,  half  awake,  out  came 
Sagamore — the  Second,  but  like  the  First  alive 
again — to  yawn  and  stretch  on  his  doorstep.  The 
dog's  collar  shone  in  the  sun. 

"We  thought  you'd  like  to  find  your  house 
ready,"  said  a  voice  that  he  knew.  "So  we  came 
and  pitched  our  tent." 

Mary  Prior  had  followed  her  dog  to  the  thres- 
hold. She  stood  there  smiling  down  at  the  wan- 
derer. Indoors  beyond  her  Salem  caught  a 
glimpse  of  Trapper's  mother,  Mrs.  Kingcome, 
the  little  mother  of  a  giant,  who  turned  long 
enough  from  her  cooking  to  throw  him  a  bright- 
eyed  welcome  and  a  wave  of  her  fork. 

"The  men,"  said  Mary,  "are  camping  above,  in 
the  next  cove.     There  they  come  now." 

A  birch  canoe  gilded  with  sunlight  stole  in 
through  the  reeds,  two  weighty  figures  ballasting 
her.  Trapper  flourished  his  paddle.  Captain 
John  Constantine  held  in  air  a  pickerel  that 
seemed  longer  than  his  arm,  and  bellowed  so  that 
the  woods  rang: 

"How's  that  for  breakfast?" 

Salem  called  back  an  inarticulate  hail,  and 
turned. 

"You  don't  object?"  said  the  girl. 

His  face  shone. 


178  THE  WINTER  BELL 

"Object?    I — I  want  to  break  something!"  he 

cried.     "You  folks  "     He  could  not  finish. 

"Why,  then,  we  were!  We  were  swimming  in 
the  lake  together  before  sunrise !" 

She  was  not  so  pale  as  he  remembered  her. 

"Are  you  sorry,"  she  asked,  "not  to  have  it 
all  to  yourself  alone?" 


THE  END 


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